Well, as with all things online, the quality of role-play tends to come and go. And yes, there is a reason I posted this here instead of in the RP Lounge, namely that the Lounge tends to be overlooked. However, if either of the mods feel this is not a good reason, feel free to move it. I just used my best judgement as to what would attract the most attention. Anyways, back to what this is all about: a list of bad habits that all RPrs, old and new (myself included) should attempt to avoid. This is not meant against anyone in particular, just a few things that I would like to see people make an effort to correct.

The Slapdash Character: Try to spend a decent length of time writing a new character. I try to take at LEAST 15 minutes, 20-30 for ones I intend to reuse. Believe me, a hastily-thrown together character shows, and they aren't much fun to RP as or with. If you're reusing a character, modifying them to the RP is an obvious move, but also try to correct the things you found made them less fun to play as in previous RPs.

The Cliche Character: Yes, we've all been there, particularly when we start RPing. But theses are characters such as the Cynical Mercenary, the Angsty But Still Good Demon, the Warrior With A Tragic Past, etc. etc. Yes, these can be fun characters to play at times, but they're incredibly common and it's nice to see an RPr take the effort to come up with something out of the ordinary. I'm guilty of creating and using such characters myself, but I try to avoid it.

The One-Liner: I disagree with the decision to enforce a four-line/one-paragraph rule in the RP forums because circumstances do arise where such a rule is, quite simply, inane and actually DETRACTS from post quality (this is especially true in drawn-out conversations), but it's nice to see people make the effort to add as much detail as possible.

The No-setting Plot: You can have gobs of plot in an RP, I mean, and immensely detailed, drawn-out affair, but what about the setting? What season is it? Is it mountainous? Humid? Does it snow almost year-round? Is it far to the north, or equatorial? All these things effect the setting of the plot. Like, if it's far to the north or south, the seasons won't be as diverse, and the days and nights, much longer, depending on the season. The Araura Borealis (or Astraulias) will show up too. Is it a rich county or a poor one? Densely populated? All of this is important.

The Not-applicable-to-element Character (applies to elemental RPs only): I know I spoke against cliched characters earlier, but if your character has control of a specific element, they're HIGHLY likely (read: certainly) to reflect traits of it in their personalities. So a water-element mage isn't going to be hasty or reckless, as those are traits given to the fire-element. Similarly, a light-element character isn't going to be a hyper-depressive cutter.

The Optional Personality: This is a personal pet peeve of mine. I HATE seeing the Personality in an RP sign-up made an option. It should, in my opinion, be a required field, along with Appearance, Name, Gender, Race and Age. There's a good reason for all this, there's a good reason for a Personality field, namely that it give you a way to force your character to act. Real people don't simply skip around from emotion to emotion, they typically have a set group of reactions and emotions. So should your character. Even better is a history that agrees with this, e.g., a happy-go-lucky, carefree character isn't going to see their parents brutally murdered in front of them when they were six.

The Punctuation And Capitilization: Put them in, and put them in right. Proper nouns, new sentences, acronyms, and "I," all get a capital. Spaces after commas, periods, question marks, semicols, etc. etc. Study the rules of punctuation and commit them to memory.

The Post That Obviously Didn't Get Read Over: I'll admit that I've done this too, when a lot of people are RPing and I'm trying to keep up, or when dinner's almost on and I'm rushed, but in general, read over each post for typos. Because typos are annoying.

Alright, that's what I personally would like to see improved upon. Just a helpful (hopefully) little list.

Chibi-chan

June 26th, 2005, 03:37 PM

I hate the clitche Rpers.....but this is because of a past event in my life i wish not to reveal yet XD. you also forgot the godly RPers...

Kratos

June 26th, 2005, 03:38 PM

O, I despise godly rpers. They are also extremly demanding too.

Kurosaki

June 26th, 2005, 05:30 PM

It's fine here, as long as it doesn't start any flaming, which I hope you guys are mature enough to avoid that.

The One-Liner: I disagree with the decision to enforce a four-line/one-paragraph rule in the RP forums because circumstances do arise where such a rule is, quite simply, inane and actually DETRACTS from post quality (this is especially true in drawn-out conversations), but it's nice to see people make the effort to add as much detail as possible.

If you haven't noticed, this one isn't enforced as strongly as the others. You have your opinion on the subject, but if you have one line, there isn't quality to begin with. I know it's supposed to be quality > quantity, but I recieved numerous complaints before the rule was made about the posts of some being too short.

~Ozy~

June 27th, 2005, 10:01 AM

I agree with the case there, and I do see that it is not as strictly enforced, but I don't think making a rule of it has helped much. If a GM wants to enforce their own rule about it, I'm fine with that, but as an overall rule, it can be unfair to new RPrs and again, detract from post quality at times.

Raichu Master

June 27th, 2005, 12:06 PM

I just want to point out one irony to you, Jake. Two of your favorite novel characters a cliche's...Drizzt is a good drow elf. Artemis is a deadly assassin with a dark past and is equally as cunning as a drow.

Just wanted to draw your attention to that. But as you said, they can be quite fun to role-play every now and then.

Here are a few more I can think of:

Diversity: Character's that reflect ones personality and looks are ok in some, but not in a lot. It took a while for me to figure that out. I would spend an hour developing a guy that was simpler to me. Why? Cause I didn't want to put the hard work into challenging myself. Instead one should try to rp a character that doesn't reflect yourself, so therefore it's more challenging because you have to think what the character would do and not yourself.

Character Creation: There are a lot of crudy characters. To name some of mine: Johann, Johann, Johann, John. Yes they all are the same thing...but they were different guys. One don't name each of your characters by the same name. I found out how rediculous it is. Two, this goes along the lines of what TAD was saying. The easiest way to find out if your character is good is look at your profile, read over it. And see if you'd want to read about it in a novel. If you wouldn't, chances are it isn't very good.

I have a few other ones but they're boarding flaming...so...I can't add them.

Chikara

June 27th, 2005, 12:24 PM

i hate RP'rs who want the RP to be about them...shouldnt this be in the RP lounge...?0.o

Miyu-chan

June 27th, 2005, 12:33 PM

Sometimes in fast pased RPs, I make my character out-going in order to make it easier to keep up w/ the story line. =/ But I don't like it that much.

And sometimes... the characters that people make get way~~ out of character. *applies to fiction also* >"<; But I really dislike seeing obvious spelling/grammar mistakes in RP posts. o.x;

~Ozy~

June 27th, 2005, 12:35 PM

I know, I know RM. Welcome to the idiosyncracies of my life.

I know, Miyu, I know... Though I've done it myself... But I try to save it for when something life-changing happens. and then they get a personality revamp, a la Chaos.

I explained the reasons why I put this in ORP in my first post, and Yukito okay'd it being here, so...

Shiney

June 28th, 2005, 11:57 AM

Yes, this is all great. Some of it I do myself, mainly because I'm lazy, but if people want to have a far better RPing experience, this should be taken to heart. I think it deserves a sticky.

Kurosaki

June 28th, 2005, 06:49 PM

If you want it stickied, it's going in the lounge. All topics like this are stickied here besides the rules. (Yes, the ratings are rules as well >>)

ThEoNeAnDoNlY555

June 29th, 2005, 10:57 AM

I believe this should be stickied in "Other RP", not the lounge.This because many new RPers would not look in the lounge before posting here, but most will read through the stickys here before posting, and if this is here then they will get to see it.

Kurosaki

June 29th, 2005, 03:46 PM

I've actually been thinking of making a thread here in ORP that contain helpful links to threads to may help them from the lounge, so how about I just do that? I'm trying to keep everything organized >> XD

~Ozy~

June 29th, 2005, 04:57 PM

I really don't care, if you think this would be helpful, by all means, include it, if not, eh, whatever. Just keep it open, this is by no means all-inclusive, and I'd like to see it added to.

Karmillina

April 2nd, 2006, 06:14 PM

Well, I hate the Godly players or Speshulness!players, they get me on my nerves.

Lily

April 2nd, 2006, 06:22 PM

Um, isn't this a little late/almost in the wrong section? o_o;

Loki

April 2nd, 2006, 06:34 PM

The One-Liner: I disagree with the decision to enforce a four-line/one-paragraph rule in the RP forums because circumstances do arise where such a rule is, quite simply, inane and actually DETRACTS from post quality (this is especially true in drawn-out conversations), but it's nice to see people make the effort to add as much detail as possible.
I thought Two-liners were just as bad Ozy. >_>

And anyway, you forgot this.

History doesn't match up?:If your character had a bad past, such as abuse, neglect, or murdering of parents before very eyes, then they'll have to attone to that. Your character is probably going to be at least partially scarred by these childhood events. So in other words, if your character had a bad history, they won't exactly be the most ditzy, most bubbly cheerleader at school.

And to add to that, even people who just try to be nice with the bad pasts who act all dramatic behind the scenes bug me out. I hope I'm not guilty of doing so, but it still bugs me out when they're perky and cheerful around people and depressed and thinking of suicide when by themselves. >=O It makes me angrah!

And I'll type this one up as well.

Gods:You're not a demi-god, or a god. You don't have control over every single player's character in the RP unless you ask permission to play their characters, and use your common sense to find out that you can only use them when the creator tells you you can do so. Powerplaying is a no-no, and is when you control another person's character without their permission.

(And yet no matter how many times I see RPers flame others for Powerplaying, I still see newbs stumble in and powerplay.)

Dialect Only: (I'm guilty of this.) Nobody wants to see a post that's just quotes and 'She said' or 'He said'. Description is what makes a post less boring to read. You could add something like 'She exclaimed' even to make it ever so slightly more amusing to read. Really long posts are easier to skip, but it makes it ever the worse when the long post is really nothing but dialect. If it's just dialect, I usually just skip them even if they're less then 5 lines. It's just boring to read.

Stickies:They're there for a reason. Read them. They help. (Why else are they at the top of the page my friends?)

I'm not sure if this is what you meant by you 'skipping of the postage' thing at the top, but I interpretted it in a different way then I'm posting it now.

Skipping:When you skip someone else's post, you often get details wrong, such as where the other character is, in what position, or sometimes what they're doing at the present moment. Sometimes these minor details can make all the difference, and even though it may get ridiculous after 2 pages missed, sometimes it worth going back while you're typing up your post and making sure you've got your facts right. (I plead guilty)

Description/Appearance: First and foremost, nobody wants to see just a picture. Most pictures don't cover the entire attire, body, clothes, and appearance in general. If you use a picture, it would be wise to type in the parts that the picture leaves out, so that your not the only person in the RP who know's what your characters shoes or back looks like. (This bugs me the most, when there's only a headshot and they're like, OKAY! Good enough for me! I see this a lot) If you are hotlinking/providing a link, you may want to check on your own browser if the link still works. Webpages such as AdvancedAnime's URL's are constantly changing, and soon, you may have a guy picture in place of your female character. (Not pretty at all)

Rejection:If the creator of the RP says that your not accepted, one post asking why you were rejected is more or less justified if the creator doesn't say in the first place, but after rejected twice or more, it gets ridiculous. If you're rejected, and you change it, quotes like 'I thought it looked better then it does now', or anything similar to that, are UNECESSARY. (sp?)

Those are my views on most of the problems in my RPs, and the RPs I'm participating in. (Woah. Long post.)

Amy-chan

April 3rd, 2006, 06:05 AM

And to add to that, even people who just try to be nice with the bad pasts who act all dramatic behind the scenes bug me out. I hope I'm not guilty of doing so, but it still bugs me out when they're perky and cheerful around people and depressed and thinking of suicide when by themselves. >=O It makes me angrah!
Yeah, that annoys me too. >_> Especially since I'm gulity of it, as you've seen. >>;

Anyway, I agree with all of the stereotypes and quirks mentioned here, and the opinions on the said. I admit myself guilty of quite a few of these things, and I think this would be very useful, even to veteran RPers, as a reference on what not to do. This is quite a thorough guide, and very accurate, and even now it can be added onto. Considering the quality of RPing here nowadays(and I'm not pointing any fingers, I myself add to it), this would be a helpful introduction on the do's and dont's for newbies and old RPers alike. I support it being stickied, and added onto when needed.

Oh, and...
Um, isn't this a little late/almost in the wrong section? o_o;
True, it was revived from almost a year ago, but the information here is still perfectly true. As for the section, ~Ozy~ explains why he put this here in the first post.

Mika

April 3rd, 2006, 06:29 AM

I'm not sure if anybody here mentioned this...

But I cannot, seriously cannot stand two things about RPs

God Moding RP Masters: Honestly. I hate, loathe, despise these people and in some ways, they have the absolute right to be this way.

These are the people who start the rp boards and refuse to let anybody else add to their plotline, (Ex. I bring up my character's past in a post) I've had people actually tell me before that I need to delete my post because I'm drawing attention away from their character and they don't like it or they don't like my character's history because it's too deep.

It's also when they believe their characters are flawless because they are the "head" of the board. I wish I could find all the rp leaders who actually humble their characters and give them cookies. @_@ It's so flippin annoying when they tell you that you cannot power play or god mode when they do it themselves. ¬¬; Once in awhile is okay, everybody has power played at one point or another, but if every post depicts that character destroying something way beyond the character's ability... it's just ridiculous

Fan Girl/Fan Boy Chars: ...I loathe despise hate curse (etc) these characters more than the above said person. My stomach churns at the sight of something along the lines of:

Optional: Mary is Riku's girlfriend they are going steady and are very happy together

Seriously. This is just plan ridiculous but thankfully only seems to happen with certian RPs. (Anything with hot male characters in them ~.~) OCxOC relationships are fine but OCxRiku (This is an example as this is the one I see the most) is not. Bring out your fantasies in FanFics, not in the RP forums. It's honestly not fair to the other RPers if a person is playing Riku and did not previously agree to being "hooked up" with the OC. If it was previously aranged, I still hate it. It's just plain unfair.

Rejection:If the creator of the RP says that your not accepted, one post asking why you were rejected is more or less justified if the creator doesn't say in the first place, but after rejected twice or more, it gets ridiculous. If you're rejected, and you change it, quotes like 'I thought it looked better then it does now', or anything similar to that, are UNECESSARY. (sp?)

I completely agree with you but I wanted to add something that kinda follows your other point about skipping.

If the RP Master says no more applications are being accepted, DO NOT APPLY

It's so obnoxious to have a poorly put together profile shoved into the middle of an rp. If they've already in the middle of something, don't post on the board. If you absolutely NEED to get in, try pming the leader, don't intrupt the flow of the RP; it'll only tick people off.

Webpages such as AdvancedAnime's URL's are constantly changing, and soon, you may have a guy picture in place of your female character. (Not pretty at all)

I completely agree. It only shows laziness if you can't type out an appearance. Pictures of outfits that are overly complex are fine but make sure you upload them to your own server. As a Web Master, I can't tell you how many times I've found my images linked without credit. It eats our bandwidth and to be honest, hot linking is just plain rude to the people who wrote out their descriptions. It takes an extra 20ish minutes sometimes to type out that appearence but once you complete it, you have that image in your mind and it doesn't leave

Hopefully I haven't repeated anybody. @_@ Just wanted to add these points.

Kurosaki

April 3rd, 2006, 11:50 AM

I completely agree. It only shows laziness if you can't type out an appearance. Pictures of outfits that are overly complex are fine but make sure you upload them to your own server. As a Web Master, I can't tell you how many times I've found my images linked without credit. It eats our bandwidth and to be honest, hot linking is just plain rude to the people who wrote out their descriptions. It takes an extra 20ish minutes sometimes to type out that appearence but once you complete it, you have that image in your mind and it doesn't leave

Not to mention there are services like Photobucket and Imageshack capable of hosting the images for you, so there really is no excuse for hotlinking. As for the typing appearance > picture thing, thats really each individuals own preference. I can't really see a problem if it's a full body shot, but if the picture shows like half the body, it tends to get annoying. If you can see the entire front of a picture, it isn't really hard to picture the back side. Now, on the topic of typing the description up, I can't stand people who type extremely long appearances, delging into uneeded details. Also, I find it hard to properly describe the appearance of the human body, and I'm sure I'm not the only one. (Not to mention I'm about as creative as a rock, XD)

Anyways, I'll move this to the RP Lounge~

Wolf_Goddess

April 3rd, 2006, 12:27 PM

Cliched
Cliched RPers bother the hell out of me! For example, I was on this one site, a wolf RP, and there's this one person that just really peeved the heck out of me! She was trying too hard to make her character uber-powerful and evil (her grammar and spelling sucked too, as well as other such key things towards Roleplaying) and, get this, her wolf's description was black pelt and red eyes, like EVERY OTHER evil wolf on the site. My character even commented on her being cliched, and she was like

((OMG, i am no cliched lol!)) in OOC, and on our site it is looked down upon to use web-chat (or as I like to call it, n00b dialect) when typing out of character.

So I beg of you, try not to make your character a cliched character. Sure, a hot-headed redhead is considered cliched, but it is true. I should know, I'm a redhead...

(But it would be nice to throw people off and have a character with a totally evil description, but his/her personality being that she/he's a sweetie or something like that.)

n00b Chat
lyke omg, dun u just h8 it wen ppl typ lyke tis?

I don't need to explain why I hate it when people talk like this, it bothers the heck out of me. But suprisingly, there are people who RP like that too! By G_d, I loathe them.

Pictures
I don't mind it when people use pictures for descriptions...but still. It shows you lack of creativity. End of story, just describe your character. Let others use their imagination.

Reading
There are some people out there who do not like to read extremely long, detailed posts. I hate it when people do that. They're like "Wow, super long...I didn't read it." and that is just disrespectful! A person probably took their time and talent to write such a post, and the person doesn't even read it? I'm sorry, if you don't like reading that much, don't Roleplay. As simple as that.

((I will add more to this list. Please comment on how crappy I did it...))

~Ozy~

April 3rd, 2006, 01:01 PM

These are all good additions, everyone, and this is always an open list. When I made this, I adressed what I saw as the main problems in the RP sections.

Loki

April 3rd, 2006, 01:58 PM

(But it would be nice to throw people off and have a character with a totally evil description, but his/her personality being that she/he's a sweetie or something like that.)

0_0 That's exactly what I loathe. You're not going to see a happy-go-lucky goth...or, I hope not. That'd be what I call, (not to their face of course) SUPAH-N00B. XD

SPAM.:I'm sure many of you know what Spam is by now, and nobody (in their right sane mind) likes reading spam. SO DON'T DO IT! *gaspeth* It's very easy to stay on topic. Spam is a no-no, but wrongly accusing someone of spam is a no-no-NO. Double check to see if it's truly spam before you say 'So-and-so, don't spam'. Because you're gonna have half the RPer's after you for doing so. (Personal experiences my friends. Personal experiences.)

Unsuccessful: Unsuccessful RP's are everywhere, but if nobody joins, or if it just goes downhill, or just plain doesn't go the way you wanted it, don't whine and gripe about it. Everyone is an individual, and perhaps they didn't fancy the topic your RP was on. And when you post an RP, it's not neccessarily going to go smoothly along the way you imagined it would. Different people have different reactions to different events. Whining and griping only makes people less enthusiastic about joining your future RP's, knowing that they'll have to deal with your attitude.

Oh. My. God. Someone did this to me as well, but no, they seriously broke down, because I said 'OMFG how did you guys get so far without me?!' and the entire roleplay board started flaming me. Claimed that the RP master was crying and they said I was a mean -----, and totally went insane. I was like 'AH! HURRICANE ANDREW IS COMIN' MY WAY!'. *rolls eyes*

Wolf_Goddess

April 3rd, 2006, 02:46 PM

0_0 That's exactly what I loathe. You're not going to see a happy-go-lucky goth...or, I hope not. That'd be what I call, (not to their face of course) SUPAH-N00B.

Well, I personally don't do wolf RP's, but I consider black fur=good white=bad. 0_0 Because an albino wolf seems so much scarier then a black one with red eyes wouldn't you agree? And a black wolf with white highlights seems so much plainer then a white wolf, and would work much better for a pack member.

~Ozy~

April 3rd, 2006, 03:57 PM

0_0 That's exactly what I loathe. You're not going to see a happy-go-lucky goth...or, I hope not. That'd be what I call, (not to their face of course) SUPAH-N00B. XD

See, that's a fine, and somewhat interesting point, actually. Yes, you aren't going to see your "happy-go-lucky goth," but what about a sadistic character, one who takes pleasure from the suffering of others, or someone completely insane who operates on similar principles? Someone completely twisted who covers it with a kind, nice, sweet act? Those can be very very interesting villians, or even player characters to interact with.

Lily

April 3rd, 2006, 04:04 PM

Oops...My profuse apologies. XP

There is one thing that bothers me to a certain extent. True, one can list RPers in these subjective categories, but I dislike those who convey the problems with a vague subtlety. It's as if they're wavering between the borderline of annoyance and normality at the same time, which makes it hard for me to be judgmental. x_x

Light_Azumarill

April 8th, 2006, 07:08 AM

I agree with everything said so far. Though, I must say I am guilty of a few of them to a certain degree. ^^; Hey, I know I'm not perfect.

Two things I have to add:

Conflict Characters: People who seem to try and make everyone hate them even when it essential that all of the characters work as a team for the plot to work. By try I mean actively try. They just pick fights with everyone and then whine in an OOC post about how no one's interacting with them or that everyone hates them. It should stand to reason that if you make everyone hate you, you will be ALONE. Which leads me to....

Whiny Loners: Those who go off one their own in an RP, don't interact with anyone's characters, and then begins to get angry when no one talks with their character. They'll start yelling at people, and then just stop posting because they aren't having any fun. Ugh... just because your character is a 'loner' doesn't mean that they can't find an exception with one person. At the very least you can still place yourself with the others. -.-

I don't think anyone else said those already... though I have been known to be guilty of "Skipping". ^-^

Alter Ego

April 8th, 2006, 11:19 AM

I want to stab an enginer right now, for I have just lost my whole post due to a keyboard malfunction. But this is irrelevant to the topic so...on to bad habits!

Ahem, first of all I'd like to express my support for most of the things said here, although there are two opinions I disagree with. One, I'm afraid that I don't agree with your comment on the one-liner thing, ~Ozy~, as I have yet to see a single RPing situation to which four lines could not be added as a response. It's all about going into detail about how your character feels about the information recieved/things taking place, thoughts, feelings...small mannerisms that that character has when talking (E.g. correcting his/her hair, fiddling with clothes, changes of pose/expression etc.), there are really very few people that are able to just stand/sitt completely still while talking with someone else, especially during lengthy conversations. And really, if you make the response one line, and then add at least one line of everything I listed above then you've already got four, so yeah. Two-liners on the other hand are always a depressing read, especially if they're made in tandem by inexperienced people with enormous signatures. At the risk of sounding crude, if you can't write four lines of coherent english then you should be signing up for a school/support lessons in english, not an RP. -.-

My second disagreement is with Kurosaki's comment about appearance descriptions. As far as I'm concerned, written description > picture, always. Allowing people to get away with pictures is basically asking for a bunch of characters who look like ones from Anime/Manga shows, which has always annoyed me, and then there's the whole image-not-here problems and whatnot which make it a very unreliable method. Also, detailed descriptions really shouldn't be underestimated as they are an excellent opportunity to convey various aspects of your character's personality. I know it's tough to think up something truly original (Clothes are a particular problem for me), but your creativity won't get any better if you don't push it a little. xD Anyways, like you said, it's a personal preference.

And now that that's over with, it's time for some bad habits:
[B]
Duck pond RPing

That is, only RPing with your own personal RP buddies and ignoring everyone else. I've seen this plenty of times and have to admit having been guilty of it myself now and again. A lesser, but just as annoying, form of duck pond RPing is always having your character navigate his/her way to the character(s) of your friend(s) and have them become bestest buddies and whanot, it's seriously discouraging for those who are not in your particular 'pond' as it makes them feel left out and ignored. Duck pond RPing is particularly bad if an RP master is doing it as, in that case, everyone else is just plain screwed because the plot is moving without them.

Irresponsible RP masters

Yes, by starting an RP and selecting the people whom you admit there you are also assuming the responsibility of making said RP work. What annoys me is that many RP masters don't see this at all, merely focusing on keeping their own character(s) and possible love interests etc. (See Duck pond RPing) in the spotlight, which really sucks for everyone else concerned. If your own character is incapacitated and can't prod the plot along, fine, just create an NPC or event that will have the same effect instead. But whatever you do, do not just leave RPers hanging without a clue of what they should be doing.

Whiny RP masters

When the RP master says 'no' it means no, yes? Well people should realize that the same applies for RPers. If an RPer doesn't want to sign up then he/she doesn't need to sign up, unfortunately, some RP masters don't seem to realize this and so choose to pester people with endless 'plz join' PMs. Inviting people is one thing, and I have nothing against those who do so in order to get the RPers they want in as long as they respect the decision of the RPer in question, but pestering them and spamming up their PM boxes is another.

Species identification (Mostly for pokémorph RPs)

Okay, this has been a peeve of mine from the very beginning. Am I really the only one who finds it a little bit odd that every pokémorph is somehow capable of identifying the exact species of every other pokémorph they come across? And indeed, how come even every trainer knows the types, names, and abilities of every individual pokémon in existence? Now you as an RPer might sitt there with all the answers ready, but unless there's a very good reason for the character in question to possess this knowledge then I fail to see why he/she should have it.

So yeah, those are some of the habits which annoy me and haven't been listed yet (Or at least I don't think they have), and I'm sure that there are many I missed, but I'll just end here before my keyboard decides to die on me again. ~_~

Kogenta

April 8th, 2006, 01:56 PM

Though I understand the reasoning behind the desire for a typed physical description, I occasionally find it easier to design and portray my character with pencil and paper than with words--especially with more unique aspects of my character's appearance.

Although I usually describe my character via keyboard, sometimes I prefer to draw and scan them. :: shrug ::

Lily

April 8th, 2006, 02:07 PM

Drawing and describing them might work, too, if you want to convey the exact appearance. I've seen people try that method, and it worked out just fine.

~Ozy~

April 8th, 2006, 03:11 PM

One, I'm afraid that I don't agree with your comment on the one-liner thing, ~Ozy~, as I have yet to see a single RPing situation to which four lines could not be added as a response. It's all about going into detail about how your character feels about the information recieved/things taking place, thoughts, feelings...small mannerisms that that character has when talking (E.g. correcting his/her hair, fiddling with clothes, changes of pose/expression etc.), there are really very few people that are able to just stand/sitt completely still while talking with someone else, especially during lengthy conversations.

I still have to diasgree on that. In some cases, many I believe, less is indeed more. That, and a great many of those things can be conveyed in a short space if the writer is skilled. Rule #17 of The Elements of Style is "Eliminate uncessary words." It is sound advice in many ways. You can (and I have in the past) conveyed all of those details in three lines by following that rule. Furthermore, such detail is occasionally detrimental. If Ernest Hemingway had reworked A Farewell to Arms to meet your standards, it would have lost much of its impact. Good writing is more than length, and I will always, ALWAYS stress quality over quantity.

Lily

April 8th, 2006, 03:42 PM

o.o; If one stresses on the importance of quality, surely that will ensue in shorter RP posts, which is relatively unwanted in accordance to forums. If someone assigns a specific length, and yet by eliminating unnecessary details, it is still possible for one to reach that length. Such details in this case are not harmful considering RPs are solely based on interaction, and everything you input will be studied upon, as stories are different from them...at least, this is purely my opinion based on your reasoning. ._.;

~Ozy~

April 8th, 2006, 04:24 PM

Given, though as roleplaying is almost a multi-author story, continuity is a factor, as is writing skill. I prefer to see the two of those over length. However, if an RP and the character used in it is compelling, neither item should necessarily be a problem. Thinking about it in-depth, I find the theoretical question of length to be moot, as if there is a skilled RP Master and a skilled RPr, then post length and post quality will come naturally. The practical question is different, though, and I would rather focus on quality. Take for example, a formemr meber by the name of kirby0_0. Long RP posts, no one could fault that, but the quality was very much lacking. Once the quality of the RP writing as reached a reasonable and consistant level, then I find it a good time to concern yourself with length.

Kogenta

April 8th, 2006, 04:27 PM

Even in the event that someone could contain an incredibly worthwhile, quality piece of information within one line, how many people would have that skill? And, how many people would simply abuse the use of one-line posts? How would it be possible to make that individual distinction, being that it would be based on opinion alone?

Having a required minimum of four lines is something concrete that can be judged by fact, rather than having the risk of accusations of favoritism.

:: shrug :: At the least, that is what seemed logical to me . . .

~Ozy~

April 8th, 2006, 04:34 PM

Hence the contrast between the theoretical and the practical. Yes, getting people to write in a skilled manner consistantly is somewhat subjective and far more time-consuming, especially on a general-intrest forum such as this (as opposed to a dedicated RP board) than is setting a length requirment, but I still see it as the better approach. Furthermore, I didn't say that all of that could be contained in one line. The best I've ever done that contained thought, emotion, action and dialogue was three lines. I do not advocate having absolutely NO length requirement, but asking people to insert inane detail for the sake of meeting said requirement if they do not posess the skill to make the extra reading worthwhile is a detriment, not an asset.

Kurosaki

April 8th, 2006, 04:53 PM

I wouldn't have any qualms about eliminating the limit rule if not for the fact that many posts like this (http://www.pokecommunity.com/showpost.php?p=1765917&postcount=293) would rise once more. (Sorry to the member who's post this is, it was the closest example)

I'd also like to express my dislike of those who don't read all of the posts, and just act on what they want to do instead of taking into consideration of what all of the other characters will do. (I'm guilty of is at well) It just comes to a point where a lot of the members get left out and decide to leave.

~Ozy~

April 8th, 2006, 05:09 PM

I do understand your concern very well, and I would actually like to compliment the RP Mods for doing so much to improve the general quality of the RPs here. I suppose my main issue is that there seems too much pressure to meet length requiremnts, even wheen it means sacrificing quality to do so.

Kurosaki

April 8th, 2006, 05:16 PM

I do understand your concern very well, and I would actually like to compliment the RP Mods for doing so much to improve the general quality of the RPs here. I suppose my main issue is that there seems too much pressure to meet length requiremnts, even wheen it means sacrificing quality to do so.
I don't really warn people about short posts unless the posts are like the example given, and I don't believe Ookami does either. That rule is there as more of a guideline than anything.

~Ozy~

April 8th, 2006, 05:32 PM

I don't get the pressure feeling from the either of you, on the contrary. I find both to be understanding of that. I typically get that feeling from other RPrs, it seems almost like a contest at times as to who can type the most three-page responses. Not to criticize, but to me it seems that this behavior seems if nod condoned, subtextually implied by the two of you through a suggested length requirement. I truly would like to see more of a push for quality. There does come a point when things are too detailed for the good of the RP as a whole.

Faltzer

April 8th, 2006, 05:54 PM

God mod RPers is what I hate most.they always want to do something to make themselves look good.

Lily

April 8th, 2006, 06:19 PM

Even if quality is far more significant, not everyone can impose the correct amount of details and such. Rather, they seem to have the opposite problem, which is the lack of details, thus forcing Kurosaki/Ookami to enforce the quantity rate. In the case of skilled RPers, we all have our different methods. I don't think it's possible to convert everyone to quality, though, since we're all used to our style by now. x.x;

Alter Ego

April 8th, 2006, 11:34 PM

I still have to diasgree on that. In some cases, many I believe, less is indeed more. That, and a great many of those things can be conveyed in a short space if the writer is skilled. Rule #17 of The Elements of Style is "Eliminate uncessary words." It is sound advice in many ways. You can (and I have in the past) conveyed all of those details in three lines by following that rule. Furthermore, such detail is occasionally detrimental. If Ernest Hemingway had reworked A Farewell to Arms to meet your standards, it would have lost much of its impact. Good writing is more than length, and I will always, ALWAYS stress quality over quantity.

And there are stories written solely in dialogue (Efficient for that very reason), and a lovely little book called 'The Dwarf' (Written by a Swedish author so I'm not sure if you know it) which was written purely in the form of a diary, but that doesn't mean that either of those techniques is ever going to work for RPing. ~_~ Hemingway's style of writing is very difficult to do properly and would only work if everyone in the RP could do it, and seeing the general level of RPing around here around here I can't see that happening. Long and descriptive might not be the eptiome of style, but it's a fairly easy technique to learn and makes it easier for others to understand your character's motives (As opposed to making him/her look irrational) and thus actually get more out of the RP. As it is, not enforcing length and descriptiveness leads to posts like the one Kurosaki showed. So yeah, I rest my case. Quality > Quantity, yes, but for those who aren't professional writers it becomes easier to achieve quality with quantity. Please also note that some styles of writing depend on length and descriptiveness. For instance, and I know this isn't the best example, Zadie Smith's novels depend heavily on listing countless seemingly irrelevant details to bring forth both information and mood and would in turn loose their impact if adapted to Ernest Hemingway's style. Yes, quality can be achieved with shortness, but that doesn't mean that it's the only way. <.<

So yeah, quantity doesn't always bring quality, but the fact of the matter is that a majority of the quality posts here are short, and I challenge you to find a single example of a Hemingwayish short post of quality.

Concerning the description-thing, well, you do have a point Kogenta...but still, it's always better to have at least some kind of writing description which is then supported by means of a picture, if only to give those less proficient in describing clothes and the human body something to work off.

As for enforcing quality, well, I agree that it would be better, but the problem is, how do you enforce quality, and who gets to decide what quality is? Obviously going "Okay, from now on your posts must be good." is not going to work. So yes, it's a lovely goal, but I for one can't think of any concrete way of striving towards it.

Xhaiden

April 9th, 2006, 05:28 PM

Hmm things that irritate me about roleplayer? That is indeed an interest question. I strongly dislike first person point of view in rps, mainly because in rps there are usually more then one person and it can get confusing. I also agree with Alter-Kun on the picture thing. I can not STAND it when people just rip off of another anime or something for a character unless they are rping that particular character. It shows lack of creativity and those people should not rp unless they are willing to make their own characters. (Not counting rps that are of actual Manga/Anime/ect.) This thread amuses me greatly I must say...

Loki

April 9th, 2006, 05:30 PM

XD Wow you guy's can really go. But I suppose I would've joined in had I had the oppotunity. Anyway, you all realize that even though we talk about whining and griping, we are- in a way- whining and griping ourselves? XD Me included. We all point things out that we find annoying, yet many of these crimes (<-HAHAHA) we have performed ourselves.

I'm not usually one for compassion, and you'll tell by the way I phrase this, but even though those n00b RPer's who bug the blargh outta everyone kinda suck at RPing and make everything worse for us, they're having fun. Pokecommunity was founded to be a place to have fun, and of all the few places I've seen of Pokecommunity, (other then the hacking section) this place is rather uptight. Not everyone is your professional Hemingway, which by the way I have no idea who that is. ^_^ But still, though they're taking our fun away, aren't we sinking to their level when taking away their "fun"? (Though I find it hard to see just how "fun" it gets when I can't even decipher what the poster is trying to say)

My second disagreement is with Kurosaki's comment about appearance descriptions. As far as I'm concerned, written description > picture, always. Allowing people to get away with pictures is basically asking for a bunch of characters who look like ones from Anime/Manga shows, which has always annoyed me, and then there's the whole image-not-here problems and whatnot which make it a very unreliable method. Also, detailed descriptions really shouldn't be underestimated as they are an excellent opportunity to convey various aspects of your character's personality. I know it's tough to think up something truly original (Clothes are a particular problem for me), but your creativity won't get any better if you don't push it a little. xD Anyways, like you said, it's a personal preference.

It's not always that easy to describe an appearance. If it's really complicated, with a lot of different layers and things like that, if you want to convey to the others just how different the look is, it's not easy through words. Because you will imagine something different then someone else, but when you see the same picture, you recieve the same image. ^_^

One-liners. First off, if you haven't seen any of those, you need to join someone's RP. Someone who posts one-liners as well. I have done so on many accounts, and hahahaha. The sarcasm there is heavy. There is little more then four lines if fourlines at all. My posts are usually dialog, and thinking to themselves, and I suppose that is unnesseccary padding, but you haven't seen me complain about marshmallow padding yet have you? ^_^;; But the one liners are usually a reeeally long quote with a 'he said' at the end.

Like so---
"No!" He shouted "You can't touch that because it's dangerous! You might get really hurt Lila, and I can't bear to see you get hurt!"

Ah yes I have seen posts as bluntly stating their interest in having a romance in the beginnning of the RP. But as you can see, I'm not even entirely sure that'll end up as even one line. I may have to edit. -_- But that is quite literally what some people would do, if the other's, (us) didn't flame them about it. Even when I say 'I believe there is a four line minimum rule', I see...one more line at most?

Advice:When someone gives you advice on roleplaying, it's usually up to you to decide whether it's good advice, or bad advice. Not only the mods give good advice, as you'll notice they're not the holy gods of the entire world. Everyone has different views on things, but when someone gives you advice, it becomes your responsibility to decide whether or not to go through with it. But sometimes, the advice people give, aren't those kinds. Sometimes, it's just the plain fact that you're lacking the common sense to read the rules, or just accidentally missed something. Take the advice when it is made clear it is a rule the first time, or someone's gonna start pushing that pretty button on the top right hand corner of your post.

Hmm, since I'm too lazy to quote Kagome, I have to say...It also bugs me when someone rips off an anime/manga/game character, but when I rip it off, I don't use characters that I have actually seen in anime, unless the RP calls for it. (Seen those crossover originals RPs yet?) Most of my pictures come from games/animes/manga that I will most likely never see any more of then that picture. I try to never use pictures from games and anime I have played/seen before.

Mika

April 10th, 2006, 02:42 PM

My second disagreement is with Kurosaki's comment about appearance descriptions. As far as I'm concerned, written description > picture, always. Allowing people to get away with pictures is basically asking for a bunch of characters who look like ones from Anime/Manga shows, which has always annoyed me, and then there's the whole image-not-here problems and whatnot which make it a very unreliable method. Also, detailed descriptions really shouldn't be underestimated as they are an excellent opportunity to convey various aspects of your character's personality. I know it's tough to think up something truly original (Clothes are a particular problem for me), but your creativity won't get any better if you don't push it a little. xD Anyways, like you said, it's a personal preference.

And this Alter, is why people worship you. @_@

Or 'least, tis why ah do. o-o

I seriously cannot stand people who just stab up a picture. It... just... geeze... If it's original, fine. That's great. :3 I love original. Original shows the same amount of effort you'd put into a writen description. However, those ones people steal from AnimeNation (Thus my previous hatred rant towards bandwidth eaters) and say "OMG!!!!111 luk at my originl art/ luk at my char so original" need to be sent to the Hall of Death and get a few holes poked in them (Kudos to anybody who catches that humour)

People spent a long time drawing those. xx Trace if you have to but put some friggen effort into it.

Loki

April 11th, 2006, 01:56 PM

Er, but these RP's are our pasttimes. Not our jobs. XP Not many people are willing to spend that much time to trace, especially since it's hard to trace a color image. Then you gotta print it and everything, and my mom's very touchy about color ink. But, didn't the artists spend that much time drawing them, for the public to see? 0_0;; But w/e, it doesn't matter. The reason I don't use my drawings for my character's, is because, I personally don't like the way I draw. Not everyone is good at drawing. And I just can't portray my character's appearance through my skills. o~o

See last post for reasons on typing description, and below.

I'm not objecting to either one, I'm just giving a debate. I don't think everyone can put out the same amount of effort. Everyone has their limits, and being a perfectionist, I'd rather not spend two hours drawing out a character and coloring it etc. etc. Besides, what bothers me the most, is that, only a select few take the time to actually type out what their character's look like in detail. Otherwise, I have to imagine everything else, and most of the facts I get wrong. It bothers the everything outta me!!

Garouga! Bare Your Fangs!

April 14th, 2006, 07:05 PM

Even if quality is far more significant, not everyone can impose the correct amount of details and such. Rather, they seem to have the opposite problem, which is the lack of details, thus forcing Kurosaki/Ookami to enforce the quantity rate. In the case of skilled RPers, we all have our different methods. I don't think it's possible to convert everyone to quality, though, since we're all used to our style by now. x.x;

To me, "style" is the character you're used to creating. I prefer a laid-back person who can just barely back up their lazy, overconfident mouth. I throw in a twist most of the time, but don't change it completely because I'll forget the change and RP as the character I'm used to. Most of us are like that, even if we don't want to admit it.
Written descriptions are better than pictures because if you're ripping off a character, you can tweak the design a little (but that doesn't make it RIGHT). Then you can feel free to add a personality you're used to. If you rip off a picture, people know who it is, how they act, and anything else about them. Either way, ripping off a character is just an act of unimaginative laziness.

Jack O'Neill

April 15th, 2006, 02:23 PM

The Slapdash Character: Try to spend a decent length of time writing a new character. I try to take at LEAST 15 minutes, 20-30 for ones I intend to reuse. Believe me, a hastily-thrown together character shows, and they aren't much fun to RP as or with. If you're reusing a character, modifying them to the RP is an obvious move, but also try to correct the things you found made them less fun to play as in previous RPs.15-30 minutes? That's rather quick for me. I often spend upwards of 45 minutes to an hour writing up my characters. Taking your time on something like this is always a good thing, 'cause a rushed job almost always sucks.

The Cliche Character: Yes, we've all been there, particularly when we start RPing. But theses are characters such as the Cynical Mercenary, the Angsty But Still Good Demon, the Warrior With A Tragic Past, etc. etc. Yes, these can be fun characters to play at times, but they're incredibly common and it's nice to see an RPr take the effort to come up with something out of the ordinary. I'm guilty of creating and using such characters myself, but I try to avoid it.Guilty of that too, but only on rare occasions. I always try my best to make up something original or at least put my own personal twist on a cliché.

The One-Liner: I disagree with the decision to enforce a four-line/one-paragraph rule in the RP forums because circumstances do arise where such a rule is, quite simply, inane and actually DETRACTS from post quality (this is especially true in drawn-out conversations), but it's nice to see people make the effort to add as much detail as possible.Agreed. There are times one-liners can't be helped.

The No-setting Plot: You can have gobs of plot in an RP, I mean, and immensely detailed, drawn-out affair, but what about the setting? What season is it? Is it mountainous? Humid? Does it snow almost year-round? Is it far to the north, or equatorial? All these things effect the setting of the plot. Like, if it's far to the north or south, the seasons won't be as diverse, and the days and nights, much longer, depending on the season. The Araura Borealis (or Astraulias) will show up too. Is it a rich county or a poor one? Densely populated? All of this is important.Guilty of that, but sometimes, settings involve at least some measure of common sense. I mean, do you expect to see snow in Vietnam or the Philippines? Do you expect to see a shining metropolis bustling with people along the Ho Chi Minh Trail or in the Philippine countryside?

The Optional Personality: This is a personal pet peeve of mine. I HATE seeing the Personality in an RP sign-up made an option. It should, in my opinion, be a required field, along with Appearance, Name, Gender, Race and Age. There's a good reason for all this, there's a good reason for a Personality field, namely that it give you a way to force your character to act. Real people don't simply skip around from emotion to emotion, they typically have a set group of reactions and emotions. So should your character. Even better is a history that agrees with this, e.g., a happy-go-lucky, carefree character isn't going to see their parents brutally murdered in front of them when they were six....Now I know what I've been forgetting.

The Punctuation And Capitilization: Put them in, and put them in right. Proper nouns, new sentences, acronyms, and "I," all get a capital. Spaces after commas, periods, question marks, semicols, etc. etc. Study the rules of punctuation and commit them to memory.If you can't type coherently, then you shouldn't RP, simple as that.

The Post That Obviously Didn't Get Read Over: I'll admit that I've done this too, when a lot of people are RPing and I'm trying to keep up, or when dinner's almost on and I'm rushed, but in general, read over each post for typos. Because typos are annoying.Also guilty of that. I rarely make typos anyway.

History doesn't match up?:If your character had a bad past, such as abuse, neglect, or murdering of parents before very eyes, then they'll have to attone to that. Your character is probably going to be at least partially scarred by these childhood events. So in other words, if your character had a bad history, they won't exactly be the most ditzy, most bubbly cheerleader at school.

And to add to that, even people who just try to be nice with the bad pasts who act all dramatic behind the scenes bug me out. I hope I'm not guilty of doing so, but it still bugs me out when they're perky and cheerful around people and depressed and thinking of suicide when by themselves. >=O It makes me angrah!Can't say I've been guilty of that. I try my best to match histories with personalities.

Gods:You're not a demi-god, or a god. You don't have control over every single player's character in the RP unless you ask permission to play their characters, and use your common sense to find out that you can only use them when the creator tells you you can do so. Powerplaying is a no-no, and is when you control another person's character without their permission.Guilty, but in some of the RPs I've been in, the creators give permission for others to use their characters; I never give permission, however, and I've had to deal with quite a few powerplayers.

Dialect Only: (I'm guilty of this.) Nobody wants to see a post that's just quotes and 'She said' or 'He said'. Description is what makes a post less boring to read. You could add something like 'She exclaimed' even to make it ever so slightly more amusing to read. Really long posts are easier to skip, but it makes it ever the worse when the long post is really nothing but dialect. If it's just dialect, I usually just skip them even if they're less then 5 lines. It's just boring to read.Not guilty. I always try to sprinkle in at least some description.

Stickies:They're there for a reason. Read them. They help. (Why else are they at the top of the page my friends?)I never read stickies. To me, RPing's basically intuitive anyway.

Skipping:When you skip someone else's post, you often get details wrong, such as where the other character is, in what position, or sometimes what they're doing at the present moment. Sometimes these minor details can make all the difference, and even though it may get ridiculous after 2 pages missed, sometimes it worth going back while you're typing up your post and making sure you've got your facts right. (I plead guilty)I make it a point to read everything, so skipping's not that big of a problem for me. I do have lapses in concentration, however.

Description/Appearance: First and foremost, nobody wants to see just a picture. Most pictures don't cover the entire attire, body, clothes, and appearance in general. If you use a picture, it would be wise to type in the parts that the picture leaves out, so that your not the only person in the RP who know's what your characters shoes or back looks like. (This bugs me the most, when there's only a headshot and they're like, OKAY! Good enough for me! I see this a lot) If you are hotlinking/providing a link, you may want to check on your own browser if the link still works. Webpages such as AdvancedAnime's URL's are constantly changing, and soon, you may have a guy picture in place of your female character. (Not pretty at all)Guilty, guilty, guilty. Most of the time, I take the time to type out my descriptions, but there are other times when I get lazy and just slap a picture on there. Sometimes, the picture fits (I once played a character who was an expert cosplayer), and sometimes, it doesn't. Visual aids can be useful, but don't try to abuse them out of laziness.

Rejection:If the creator of the RP says that your not accepted, one post asking why you were rejected is more or less justified if the creator doesn't say in the first place, but after rejected twice or more, it gets ridiculous. If you're rejected, and you change it, quotes like 'I thought it looked better then it does now', or anything similar to that, are UNECESSARY. (sp?)Never really had to deal with rejection anyway.

God Moding RP Masters: Honestly. I hate, loathe, despise these people and in some ways, they have the absolute right to be this way.

These are the people who start the rp boards and refuse to let anybody else add to their plotline, (Ex. I bring up my character's past in a post) I've had people actually tell me before that I need to delete my post because I'm drawing attention away from their character and they don't like it or they don't like my character's history because it's too deep.

It's also when they believe their characters are flawless because they are the "head" of the board. I wish I could find all the rp leaders who actually humble their characters and give them cookies. @_@ It's so flippin annoying when they tell you that you cannot power play or god mode when they do it themselves. ¬¬; Once in awhile is okay, everybody has power played at one point or another, but if every post depicts that character destroying something way beyond the character's ability... it's just ridiculousGuilty, but only on rare occasions. Besides, I'm almost always a participant anyway.

Fan Girl/Fan Boy Chars: ...I loathe despise hate curse (etc) these characters more than the above said person. My stomach churns at the sight of something along the lines of:

Optional: Mary is Riku's girlfriend they are going steady and are very happy together

Seriously. This is just plan ridiculous but thankfully only seems to happen with certian RPs. (Anything with hot male characters in them ~.~) OCxOC relationships are fine but OCxRiku (This is an example as this is the one I see the most) is not. Bring out your fantasies in FanFics, not in the RP forums. It's honestly not fair to the other RPers if a person is playing Riku and did not previously agree to being "hooked up" with the OC. If it was previously aranged, I still hate it. It's just plain unfairFanpeople disgust me, plain and simple.

If the RP Master says no more applications are being accepted, DO NOT APPLY

It's so obnoxious to have a poorly put together profile shoved into the middle of an rp. If they've already in the middle of something, don't post on the board. If you absolutely NEED to get in, try pming the leader, don't intrupt the flow of the RP; it'll only tick people off.I never butt in when RPers are obviously in the middle of something, even if applications are supposedly always open. Just leave them be unless they specifically request your presence.

n00b Chat
lyke omg, dun u just h8 it wen ppl typ lyke tis?

I don't need to explain why I hate it when people talk like this, it bothers the heck out of me. But suprisingly, there are people who RP like that too! By G_d, I loathe them.If you can't type in proper English, then don't RP. I can't stress that point any more.

Reading
There are some people out there who do not like to read extremely long, detailed posts. I hate it when people do that. They're like "Wow, super long...I didn't read it." and that is just disrespectful! A person probably took their time and talent to write such a post, and the person doesn't even read it? I'm sorry, if you don't like reading that much, don't Roleplay. As simple as that.I'm one such person given over to writing long and detailed posts, and yes, it's insulting when people don't bother reading. And I agree that if you don't want to read, then don't RP.

SPAM.:I'm sure many of you know what Spam is by now, and nobody (in their right sane mind) likes reading spam. SO DON'T DO IT! *gaspeth* It's very easy to stay on topic. Spam is a no-no, but wrongly accusing someone of spam is a no-no-NO. Double check to see if it's truly spam before you say 'So-and-so, don't spam'. Because you're gonna have half the RPer's after you for doing so. (Personal experiences my friends. Personal experiences.)Agreed. It's basically common sense.

Unsuccessful: Unsuccessful RP's are everywhere, but if nobody joins, or if it just goes downhill, or just plain doesn't go the way you wanted it, don't whine and gripe about it. Everyone is an individual, and perhaps they didn't fancy the topic your RP was on. And when you post an RP, it's not neccessarily going to go smoothly along the way you imagined it would. Different people have different reactions to different events. Whining and griping only makes people less enthusiastic about joining your future RP's, knowing that they'll have to deal with your attitude.Most, if not all, of my RPs are unsuccessful, but you don't hear me whining.

Conflict Characters: People who seem to try and make everyone hate them even when it essential that all of the characters work as a team for the plot to work. By try I mean actively try. They just pick fights with everyone and then whine in an OOC post about how no one's interacting with them or that everyone hates them. It should stand to reason that if you make everyone hate you, you will be ALONE. Which leads me to....

Whiny Loners: Those who go off one their own in an RP, don't interact with anyone's characters, and then begins to get angry when no one talks with their character. They'll start yelling at people, and then just stop posting because they aren't having any fun. Ugh... just because your character is a 'loner' doesn't mean that they can't find an exception with one person. At the very least you can still place yourself with the others. -.-If playing the anti-social and bellicose loner doesn't work in real life, then it sure as hell won't work in an RP.

Duck pond RPing

That is, only RPing with your own personal RP buddies and ignoring everyone else. I've seen this plenty of times and have to admit having been guilty of it myself now and again. A lesser, but just as annoying, form of duck pond RPing is always having your character navigate his/her way to the character(s) of your friend(s) and have them become bestest buddies and whanot, it's seriously discouraging for those who are not in your particular 'pond' as it makes them feel left out and ignored. Duck pond RPing is particularly bad if an RP master is doing it as, in that case, everyone else is just plain screwed because the plot is moving without them.I've encountered my fair share of duck pond RPs, and I must say that it's an unsavoury practice. People should be given a chance to prove themselves.

Irresponsible RP masters

Yes, by starting an RP and selecting the people whom you admit there you are also assuming the responsibility of making said RP work. What annoys me is that many RP masters don't see this at all, merely focusing on keeping their own character(s) and possible love interests etc. (See Duck pond RPing) in the spotlight, which really sucks for everyone else concerned. If your own character is incapacitated and can't prod the plot along, fine, just create an NPC or event that will have the same effect instead. But whatever you do, do not just leave RPers hanging without a clue of what they should be doing.Responsibility is an essential part of RPing, as it is with just about everything else. Always make sure to tend after your flock, lest they be eaten by the wolves.

Whiny RP masters

When the RP master says 'no' it means no, yes? Well people should realize that the same applies for RPers. If an RPer doesn't want to sign up then he/she doesn't need to sign up, unfortunately, some RP masters don't seem to realize this and so choose to pester people with endless 'plz join' PMs. Inviting people is one thing, and I have nothing against those who do so in order to get the RPers they want in as long as they respect the decision of the RPer in question, but pestering them and spamming up their PM boxes is another.Choice is the problem here. Personally, I don't like to pester people into joining; they should join out of their own free will, not because they've been coerced.

I'll try to address more points as I see them.

parallelzero

April 19th, 2006, 02:56 PM

Jack, was that just out of boredom, or what? XD

Relationships: Probably been brought up before, but I hate it when two RPers focus everything around the relationship of only their two characters. RPs are supposed to involve everyone, and I've seen RPers kill good RPs like this...

Garouga! Bare Your Fangs!

April 19th, 2006, 05:20 PM

My views on whiny loner and duck pond RPing:

Personally, I prefer having my character off alone with occasional contact to the others. That way, you don't have to wait on other people to post. Whining about it, however, is just immature. If you made it that way, that's your fault. Don't let your anger out on everyone else because of what YOU, and you alone, did.

Now, I don't duck pond because of my reason stated above. That's just plain dumb. Duck ponding would be a good reason for someone to become a loner, because they really are being rejected by the others. If the entire RP is a team thing and a few people go off on their own and neglect everyone, then that RP will never work out.

That's pretty much it. Please feel free to correct me if I'm wrong.

Loki

April 19th, 2006, 06:07 PM

Jack, was that just out of boredom, or what? XD

Relationships: Probably been brought up before, but I hate it when two RPers focus everything around the relationship of only their two characters. RPs are supposed to involve everyone, and I've seen RPers kill good RPs like this...

Amen. Especially when they post a billion million times and all that stuff, and it's all consecutive, Member A, Member B, Member A, Member B, etc etc. It butts everyone else out, and you're just like, wtf?

Too many events?: Wow, I've had to deal with this before. The weepy 'give-me-your-pity' character butts in on you and makes a whole bunch of issues. His/her past, his/her problems, and they seem to expect you to sort them out, all the while making it QUITE PLAIN that they wish for a relationship between your character and theirs.

My views on Duck pond. Well, I've definetly been in that position. In fact, I'm in it in one of my RP's right now, in a different forum, but what pisses me off is that, sometimes I butt in, sometimes I don't, and these dudes have set up an impenetrable wall, and it focuses on THEM AND THEM ONLY. So, I have abandoned it. Unfortunate, because it's ridiculous in the first place! Why put up a public RP just to let the other RPer's wander around by themselves for the entire thing? >=(

Garouga! Bare Your Fangs!

April 22nd, 2006, 06:33 AM

Calling battles is hard, too. If it's between two people, one of them is almost certain to call it down the middle if it looks like they'll lose. This is bound to get the winning person mad. I think if anyone in the RP is "near" the battle, they should judge. In an RP, anger leads to sabotage. Then there's a ton of arguing, spam, etc.
If you're battling a sub-character you can control, then make that fair too. If they're stronger, they're stronger. It would be better to go down fighting then to pull of an impossible win.

Jack O'Neill

April 22nd, 2006, 01:35 PM

Jack, was that just out of boredom, or what? XD

Relationships: Probably been brought up before, but I hate it when two RPers focus everything around the relationship of only their two characters. RPs are supposed to involve everyone, and I've seen RPers kill good RPs like this...
No, I did not that out of boredom. XP

The inverse of whiny loners: a pair of RPers who can't be separated even if you stick a block of C4 in between them and detonate it. Bell's right in that you can't really get a word in edgewise. Kinda like a miniature duck pond in my opinion.

Muse

April 22nd, 2006, 04:27 PM

This entire topic could be compared to real life, it seems...o0

And I think you've all covered just about all of the 'Bad Habits.' I haven't Role-Played much, but I've been lucky enough to be able to avoid almost all of the mentioned bad habits except for one: The infamous Powerplaying! It seems like those who are new to RPing are the worst when it comes to this (not to throw all of the new RPrs into one big group or anything). Controlling other people's characters probably comes from not knowing that it's a BIG no-no. I know I'm guilty of controlling other characters on accident every once in a while, especially when I was new to it. It would probably help if everyone read, understood, and lived the rules, huh.

Moral: READ THE RULES! =D

Garouga! Bare Your Fangs!

April 22nd, 2006, 06:10 PM

Powerplaying is always bad, but when they control YOUR character...*shudders* There's a reason that person is yours. You might have a whole chain of events set out, only to have them messed up by someone who takes control of your character.

Most of the stuff here is pure evil in an RP. These are the RP sins, I guess.

Loki

October 18th, 2006, 06:15 PM

Cat and Mouse: WARG. I could just...BITETHESEPEOPLE'SHEADSOFF. >.< Seriously, have you ever roleplayed in something, where it's just like, your this far away from them, and everything just goes WRONG because they can read your post and every single move your character does?

*cough* Anyway, on a more professional note, Cat and Mouse is where the person seems to take on a birds-eye view and seems to avoid everything. This is closely related to 'the super character' AKA, the mary-sue, in which the character is nearly untouchable unless you post everything in one go, and even then, manages to dodge an unlikely number of thought-out attacks, verbal assaults, or the such.

Example:
"Mary moves to the right to get a better aim.

Gary moves to the left because he felt like something bad was going to happen if he stayed where he was.

Mary moves to the left, frustrated.

Gary feels weird on the left too, so he moves to the right, just in case."

Not that exaggerated, but where you simply, chase the character because the RPer themself is like, "Oh, well, I can read your post, so I'm just going to avoid you, because I don't want my character to become the invalid, and I especially don't want to make a fool of my character by getting trapped, hit, losing, or knocked out.

Bunnying: I don't know, this has been really really really bothering me lately. Bunnying is almost worse then all-out powerplaying, because it just happen's so frequently. It's hard to do anything without bunnying, but it's possible, so why not just cut out the bunnying? There's just so much that you can kill with a simple little bunnying act, and sometime's, you end up having to change it anyway.

Short Posts: It's not hard to post four line's. We've all done it before, we're all capable of it, if you can't type four lines for each RP, don't bite off more then you can chew, cause you'll pay for it later. Also, what's the point? If you can say what you have to say in a post that replies to more then just one person, you can take care of so many more other problem's, like the duck-pond RPing, and the repitition of member A, member B, member A, member B, etc.

Just had to rant. And, I'm gonna sticky this thing. This has way too many good things in it for it NOT to be stickied. I'm gonna flaunt this in my sig the day I find room for it- in BIG red text. =_=;;

YoshiRiRu

October 18th, 2006, 08:12 PM

Call me crazy, but I haven't read this until right now. I definetely have a few gripes - Ladies and Gentlemen of the Jury, I give you...

The Ever Present Bad-Ass.

This character pisses me off to the max - unless it's played well. My first RP here entailed being dropped smack into a "Ruined World" of Kanto; basically, like FF6's World of Ruin.

Now, the EPB-A winds up in this shattered reality, and is cool as ice. There's a difference between not panicking, and not caring at all. No fear whatsoever - just utter faith in themselves. Which at 15, most young people don't possess. (I don't, anyway; and I turned 15 on Monday.[Yes, that WAS a shameless plug of my birthday, thank you.]) Which brings me to my next point.

I TOTALLY HART MY POKEMANS AND THEY NEVER HERT ME LOL CUZ I ROX!!1

Everyone does this, and it's totally normal, but for some reason, the fact that mostly everyone has a fine and dandy relationship with their pokemon, and every single one is completely under their control. I've yet to really encounter an RP where someone truly loses control of one of their pokemon, and they can always trust them COMPLETELY. This has, mind you, only begin to gripe at me recently.

The Elite Pokemon Team.

I find that many a mediocre rper has in their team one of the following, some may be combined.

A starter pokemon, or other outrageously powerful pokemon that was their first pokemon, and never has any faults. Always loyal and forgiving.
A very young, cute, charming, baby Pokemon. Pichu, Cleffa, etc. These kinds of Pokemon are always the sunshine of every pokemon team, no matter what. (guiltyguiltyguiltyguilty)
A FRICKIN' EEVEE-LUTION! Argh, this pisses me off so bad. Eevee-lutions are so old, they're almost spoiling. I can't stand to see another one, I'm sorry

I, for one, try to use sort of "unique" pokemon in my RPs, like Girafarig, or Spoink, or Lanturn. People who use the same teams ooover and oover again annoy me.

I'm sure there are more things, but those are the ones that came to mind right now.

Midnight_Dragon249

October 19th, 2006, 04:57 AM

A FRICKIN' EEVEE-LUTION! Argh, this pisses me off so bad. Eevee-lutions are so old, they're almost spoiling. I can't stand to see another one, I'm sorry.

o.O; I don't care how spoiled or old my Umbreon is: I still love it. Plus, there are 2 more in gen4. Old AND new at the same time. :P o-o' But that means I have to add those to my figure collection! Ack! <I have all 5 Eevee-lutions and Eevee sitting on my desk in my room. I'm a dork like that.>

Anyways, this is just simple stuff that bugs me. Misspelling words and incorrect use of grammer. I mean, if you know you're not the brightest lightbulb in the shed, copy+paste your post into Word, spellcheck, then copy+paste AGAIN. That just really bugs me. And I don't know why... And not just misspelling a few words, or maybe a few typos. But I mean typing something like~

Well, I'm not going to point out anyone in particular, but you all know what I mean. People who didn't pay attention in Language.

One more thing~1748 People joining an RP! It's insane!! And I guess some RP masters just don't have the heart to say, "Well, sorry, we're full," or ,"Sorry, we have others wanting to join so we can't accept someone with a bad sign-up." I know there ARE people willing to give the big rejection to someone, but I have seen quite a few RPs with a ton more people than it should have.

Loki

October 19th, 2006, 06:13 AM

The Ever Present Bad-Ass.

This character pisses me off to the max - unless it's played well. My first RP here entailed being dropped smack into a "Ruined World" of Kanto; basically, like FF6's World of Ruin.

Now, the EPB-A winds up in this shattered reality, and is cool as ice. There's a difference between not panicking, and not caring at all. No fear whatsoever - just utter faith in themselves. Which at 15, most young people don't possess. (I don't, anyway; and I turned 15 on Monday.[Yes, that WAS a shameless plug of my birthday, thank you.]) Which brings me to my next point.

LOLOLOLOLOLOLOL. Sorry, that called for chatspeak. I remember that RP: I R guilty guilty guilty. Then again, after awhile I started to dislike my RP, so I got lazy. *apologize for type's, I don't have my glasses on, so I'm kind of hoping everything isn't covered in absolute errors*

As for the pokemon thing, I was guilty of the eevee-evolution's waaaay back when, but I'm otherwise not exactly guilty of this...often. I hate having starter pokemon on my team, even though sometime's it's nesseccary. They're just so bland to me. I remember I used to have an obsession with fighting pokemon and had an entire team of fighting pokemon- not a single ray of sunshine here! (Remember Karen? Yeah.)

Faker: Someone who think's they're "TEH 00BAH MASTAH AT RPing", when they're the one's who break all the rule's because they're not that great at RPing. These guy's reaaaally bother me, but it's nice for a laugh. xD

YoshiRiRu

October 19th, 2006, 07:11 PM

LOLOLOLOLOLOLOL. Sorry, that called for chatspeak. I remember that RP: I R guilty guilty guilty. Then again, after awhile I started to dislike my RP, so I got lazy. *apologize for type's, I don't have my glasses on, so I'm kind of hoping everything isn't covered in absolute errors*

As for the pokemon thing, I was guilty of the eevee-evolution's waaaay back when, but I'm otherwise not exactly guilty of this...often. I hate having starter pokemon on my team, even though sometime's it's nesseccary. They're just so bland to me. I remember I used to have an obsession with fighting pokemon and had an entire team of fighting pokemon- not a single ray of sunshine here! (Remember Karen? Yeah.)

Faker: Someone who think's they're "TEH 00BAH MASTAH AT RPing", when they're the one's who break all the rule's because they're not that great at RPing. These guy's reaaaally bother me, but it's nice for a laugh. xD

Oh yeah, Karen.. that RP rocked my socks off. XD

Fakers piss me off from time to time, however, they don't seem to show up that much for me. I love to fight fakers, too. They always find some cheap way to win in a battle; and then it's easy to call them on it.

Nice RP masters: I'm sure everyone's encountered an RP like this - you join an RP, and someone posts a half-assed sign-up, I mean, obviously no effort or anything like that, and the RP master doesn't want to hurt the lazy ass's feelings, so he accepts them, and the overall quality of the roleplay is lowered considerably.

History and Personality Clashing: Somebody mentioned this earlier, (sorry, too lazy to look it up *_*) and it also makes me mad when people try to not only have a bubble exterior with murdered parents and other traumatic events, but also when people try too hard to break the norm (i.e. have normal, nice pasts) and then, have a sullen, angry, traumatized personality. It's really not that hard to link the two together - and it really shows in your RP skills.

Shiney

October 19th, 2006, 11:46 PM

History and Personality Clashing: Somebody mentioned this earlier, (sorry, too lazy to look it up *_*) and it also makes me mad when people try to not only have a bubble exterior with murdered parents and other traumatic events, but also when people try too hard to break the norm (i.e. have normal, nice pasts) and then, have a sullen, angry, traumatized personality. It's really not that hard to link the two together - and it really shows in your RP skills.

I don't often post here, but I wanted to make a note on the history-personality clash thing. Personality is somewhat inborn, and influenced by other factors as well, in my experience. For example, I had a wonderful childhood, not really spoiled, but I didn't exactly suffer any serious lackings, either. My parents are the most kind and understanding people I know. But I still grew up being a resentful cynic. I'm not saying that they should be completely unrelated, but sometimes, a bit of clashing should be expected, and preferred, if you want my opinion on it.

YoshiRiRu

October 20th, 2006, 05:00 AM

o.O; I don't care how spoiled or old my Umbreon is: I still love it. Plus, there are 2 more in gen4. Old AND new at the same time. :P o-o' But that means I have to add those to my figure collection! Ack! <I have all 5 Eevee-lutions and Eevee sitting on my desk in my room. I'm a dork like that.>

Anyways, this is just simple stuff that bugs me. Misspelling words and incorrect use of grammer. I mean, if you know you're not the brightest lightbulb in the shed, copy+paste your post into Word, spellcheck, then copy+paste AGAIN. That just really bugs me. And I don't know why... And not just misspelling a few words, or maybe a few typos. But I mean typing something like~

One more thing~1748 People joining an RP! It's insane!! And I guess some RP masters just don't have the heart to say, "Well, sorry, we're full," or ,"Sorry, we have others wanting to join so we can't accept someone with a bad sign-up." I know there ARE people willing to give the big rejection to someone, but I have seen quite a few RPs with a ton more people than it should have.

No, you misunderstand! I love Eevees, and all their evolutions - it's just that I can't stand how everyone has to have one in their pokemon teams. Aren't they like... oober rare?

And it seems you beat me to my previous post at the end of yours - didn't even see it. :D

Midnight_Dragon249

October 20th, 2006, 05:13 AM

No, you misunderstand! I love Eevees, and all their evolutions - it's just that I can't stand how everyone has to have one in their pokemon teams. Aren't they like... oober rare?

And it seems you beat me to my previous post at the end of yours - didn't even see it. :D

Depends on what the RP type is. If it's more game-based, they probably would be rarer, as Eevee is generally a one-off. So, you could either of gotten it by a friend breeding it, or from Oak, as him having an Eevee as a starter is obviously possible, thanks to Yellow Version.

If it is more anime-based, then...I guess finding an Eevee would be extremely lucky. Or someone who had a ton of Eevee eggs could have gone around like the Easter Bunny :P

And the chara I've made with an Umbreon is a really lucky chara. Let's see...Here it is~http://img122.imageshack.us/img122/1889/teamkr7.png . That's lucky. Or just alot of running around in one spot looking for rares. Which is what I would do if Eevee were able to be caught in the wild. I did that to get a Dratini in the Safari Zone. :D

Loki

October 20th, 2006, 02:23 PM

Yeah seriously, you'd have to spend an eon just looking for the shiny ninetales. =_=;; Though sometime's I need a prettified team to match my character, I really hate it when someone is just overdoing it. The 'super kawaii, super suteki' team just bugs the bejeezuz outta me.

Pichu, Minun, Plusle, Azurill, Cleffa, Magby- What do you plan on accomplishing with that team?

Psh. Honestly.

Optimism Overboard: Ever encountered this? The super super super optimistic person, who, in a horrible situation where like, everyone you knew just got killed or murdered or something to that extent, and they're just like... "Oh...that's too bad. But, you've always got to look on the bright side, at least I wasn't killed!" *note the sarcasm* It's just like, 'Dude, you've got some serious issues you need to sort out with yourself.'

Fakemon: Don't use them in an RP. Just don't. It's smarter if you use it in a Fanfiction with a new region- that's where it's cool! (Only if you describe them well,) But otherwise, to be as blatantly obvious as I can possibly be, DON'T use them, because nobody cares what your imagination can contribute to the pokemon franchise as far as I'm concerned. I've seen this happen before, and I was so annoyed I dropped out of the RP. It was horrible.

"Frostbite!" <---What is that?

"Black Aura!" <--- Isn't that from Yu-Gi-Oh, or Magic Cards, or something like that?

Just no.

x_x

There are so many bad habit's that can come with an RPer. I'm sure we'll have fun listing them all as they come. xDD

Midnight_Dragon249

October 20th, 2006, 03:13 PM

Yeah seriously, you'd have to spend an eon just looking for the shiny ninetales. =_=;;

In my defense, I found a shiny Electrike and Vulpix in ... I think it was Ruby or Sapphire. So, if someone hadn't of deleted my save file on Gold with my precious lv70-73 Umbreon, I could make the above team.

And people trying to join an RP right in the middle of it. Y'know, you and your group are roleplaying and could be right in the middle of a big event/battle/whatever, and *POPGASP*! A SIGN-UP SHEET! Even if in the 1st post, the RP master has said, "No more people may join," you'll STILL get people trying to sign-up. What's worse is when the sign-up sheet isn't even good. And I'm not sure if anyone has said that yet, although I'm pretty sure someone has. (but I'm too lazy to look :D; )

And I do aggree w/Bijou. I have a ton of Fakemon (More than 75) but I never use them in an RP, as no one cares about them much in an RP. It's just too hard to really use them in one. You could have a Water type fakie fighting an Electric type, then *BAM* Earthquake! And no one could argue will you doing that because it's a Fakie and doesn't have to be limited to Water, Normal, "Bite", Ice, or Electric moves. (Kyogre can learn Thunder, BTW) OR, you could say, "FakemonA hits RPerB's Raichu and totally kills it because it's an uber Fakie." Unless you have a detailed move list, stat total, and image of it, Fakies shouldn't be used. Period.

Mika

October 20th, 2006, 10:02 PM

I thought of one. The other day. When I was reading sign ups for mah own rp.

Copy and Paste Sign Up Sheets: You know, those people who snatch your own four-hour-slaved-over sign up sheet, scribble out a word here and there and then call it their own personal creation (complete with a bandwidtch stealing hot-linked picture -shakes fist at-) and then, when you reject 'em, they pm you with complaints about how they "admire" you and "it's not that similar"

Character Thiefs (I'm also dealing with this one currently.) People who want to use your character in a fan-fiction when you've said no repeatedly or worse, as an NPC in their own rp because "your character has so much potential and you're letting him/her go to waste by not going further" I'm sorry but last time I checked, I slaved over that character's sheet for 3-72 (Don't ask...) hours and created a 20 page back story (again don't ask...) not you

People who can't use simple 1st, 2nd grade level english tools (Puncutation Capitalization etc) A sub-cat of chatspeak, these are the people that don't proofread their posts, post things so badly jumbled it looks like a small child wrote them. (Mystics-coughcough-) They're also the people that repeat the same word eight times 8 times in a sentance or throw in a random learned world in place of the traditonal colliquial mess to look "advanced" without knowing it makes them look more stupid. D< Under this catagory is the common misunderstanding of an overall word tense. Nothing ticks me off more than one person rping in the 1st person while the other eight rp in 3rd. It's just... not right. ;-;

Pichu, Minun, Plusle, Azurill, Cleffa, Magby- What do you plan on accomplishing with that team?

Hey. >>; this is my little sister's team... with skitty inplace of a magby and a taillow in place of a cleffa and she loves them dearly. (She had a freakin level 80 pichu at one point...which pwned my poor ickly level 90 altaria... and it was holding an everstone. o-o) She's a baby poke freak and for a 10 year old, she's pretty good at rping them... while having them not be all innocent and cute (<< for example her pichu likes to steal things. And then run like hell. Into trees.)

Loki

October 21st, 2006, 11:01 AM

...I meant, in a roleplay that doesn't involve level's. < <; Usually those things will end up looking 00ber if it doesn't have level's, and also, it'll look unrealistic if it's that level in an RP too. Also, how many RP's around here have level's? o o; Last I checked, none.

Midnight_Dragon249

October 21st, 2006, 11:32 AM

...I meant, in a roleplay that doesn't involve level's. < <; Usually those things will end up looking 00ber if it doesn't have level's, and also, it'll look unrealistic if it's that level in an RP too. Also, how many RP's around here have level's? o o; Last I checked, none.

Pokehunter56's RP, "Region of Fossils" does. I mean, it makes no sense to have levels in an RP. Someone could say, "Oh, my lvl72 Umbreon could pwn your lvl25 Beedrill, so we don't even need to fight." Or, "Umbreon used Bite on RPer's Beedrill and it got OHKO'd." And then say "I can OHKO your Poke because mine is a higher level!" And having a baby Pokemon team in a non-leveled RP would be a really weak team. But then you get a team with Charizard, Aggron, Salamence, Metagross, Flygon, and Dragonite and people will start saying "Hey that's too good/uber of a team!" You just can't win, can you?

YoshiRiRu

October 22nd, 2006, 04:37 PM

A lot of these things can be just as bad if not worse when the circumstances are reversed. For example..

The pitiful bag of tears: We discussed before about people who are super optimistic and are always being cheery and such like that.. well, this is just the opposite.

This is the character that is miserable at all times, cries in public, and generally is an attention whore; anything to get them recognized, and possibly start a pitiful-pitier (sp?) relationship in an RP.

Super pessimists, as opposed to super optimists.

The "Rebel" This is the person who refuses to play along, or "sees" through your plot. Say for example, if you're trying to trick a group of people, and you have it written (Not said, mind you) that you're trying to trick them, and the conversation goes a bit like this.

Rp'r A:
"They went this way!" he exclaimed, pointing in the complete opposite direction that his friends had gone, knowing their trail was well covered. There was no way that anyone could have proven him wrong, and they were so riled up, that the smallest suggestion of where to go would be sure to send them raving off in that direction.

RP'r B:
"no he is lying!" said jon. "i have powers and i saw them go the other way" said jon. "dont belive him hes lying" said jon

Well, I guess that's a bit of an exxageration, but I think you get my drift.

Loki

October 22nd, 2006, 05:02 PM

...AHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!! YoshiRiRu, the rebel is SO true. I can't imagine HOW many time's that's reduced me to fist's and tears (of laughter) due to the rebel's absolute stupidity. *Arrow flies through self, words, 'guilty' written across it*

*cough* Anyway, yeah, I hate it when that happens, it's just like, Arrrrg!

Supah Gawd: Ever met that person who just never run's out of youthful fighting spirit? You know, the one that insists that they be 'left behind' or the such, to be the hero of the day? The one who, in a reasonable anime, roleplay, or manga, is the one who get's incredibly injured? Ah, but that's not the case with our Supah Gawds, they have an unlimited supply of energy, and that energy never run's out. Even after they blow up a mountain, elevate a valley, and dry up the ocean, they're still around to say, "Drat! I missed!" Then they insist they're human, just have a little more energy then everyone else.

A little?

Yeah.

YoshiRiRu

November 3rd, 2006, 11:55 PM

Okay, I'm going to post something that I do, and maye a few of you others find it annoying too, and maybe some of you are even guilty of it.

Excuses: When you've got a good RP going, and someone just HAS to not post - for whatever the reason, they can't find an excuse, and the RP goes nowhere. So a potentially great RP is ruined by people's laziness.

Anyway.

Yeah.

Alter Ego

November 4th, 2006, 01:00 AM

Nyah, excuses, excuses, excuses...yes, I'm familiar with that one. But my excuses are usually valid, like poofing off because of KH II. :O Seriously, though, I think most of the RPers around here have excused themselves many times over. It's human, but you ought to draw the line at the point where the whole RP is on the verge of extinction. I mean, at least have the decency to appoint someone else for ushering your character out of the plot's way if you can't be bothered to make the post yourself. xP Speaking of which, I seem to recall a certain RP we're both in suffering from that particular problem ATM. This wouldn't be you excusing yourself from the whole thing, would it? :P (Just kidding of course)

Aaaanyhow...about the level thing...meh, I tend to avoid that, personally. :\ Same goes with having set movesets for pokémon, I mean that's what the games are for, no wants to go through that tedious bussiness in an RP, right? I do make a point of making people stick to certain guidlines such as the type chart, trait effects learnsets (Ergo, what moves the pokémon actually can learn) and general statlines (No "Speed-trained" Snorlax outspeeding a Ninjask or other nonsense like that, thank you. <.<) but other than that I'm all for RPer liberty. Battles become dreadfully boring if all elements of creativity (E.g. Using the terrain to your advantage, applications of moves such as Rock Smash to counter a Rock Slide (Makes sense, ya' know =P) and suchlike) are taken out. I'd rather have it interesting than completely by the book. ^^

Oh, and on the fresh sins...

NPC Overload: Yeah, guilty as charged to this one. Sticking in a new NPC here and another there to prod the plot along might look like an easy solution, but the problem I've come across is that I'm in a situation where there are simply NPCs sticking out of every nook and cranny and you don't have a clue about what to do with em' all. This is mostly an RP master-type thing - as those usually end up having to carry the bulk of the NPCs - so as a piece of advice to anyone who wants to start their own RP: recycle. No, really, one well thought-out, multi-faceted character can quite well pull the weight of three simple ones created for the sake of convenience, and it will look a lot better from a plot perspective too. Not to mention that it's a lot less confusing. =3

The "Nice Character": I'm not sure if this has been mentioned already, but...have you ever come across the endlessly understanding, kind, and encouraging character who'll forgive everyone for everything every time without a shadow of a doubt but is always ready to kick evil butt? These would be the polar opposite of "troublemaker" characters, I guess, bordering on the Mary-Sue/Gary-Stu category but without the L33T battle skills of doom. I mean sure, getting along with the rest of the cast is all well and good, but let's draw the line somewhere, m'kay? No-one can always be complete and utter friends with everyone else in the group and always agree with everything they say, that's not human! <.< The worst thing is, these accursed leppers are really hard to pin down because they aren't really godmodding or powerplaying (Since they don't force others to like them or miraculously win every battle) and certainly aren't disrupting the plot. The fact that they are making you, personally, pull out your hair and scream "Can't you act normal even once?!" is unfortunately not a very good basis for kicking them out of the RP, so make sure to stamp these infernal pests out in the sign-up process. Trust me, it will save you a lot of frustrated hair-pulling later on.

Little Mr/Ms Helpful: Another peeve of mine, these are the insufferably perceptive characters who always know what must be done and always have the means to do it, typically followed by a miraculously expanding inventory of useful items. Pokémon KOed? Guess who's carrying a Max Revive. Rain? They've brought an umbrella. Mystery enemy working behind the scenes? Those incriminating documents (Complete with signatures, pictures, and detailed descriptions of all plans) just keep falling in their hands. World doomed to destruction in five seconds? They've got a time machine to make that five centuries. Regardless of the situation, Mr/Ms Helpful is on the job. This is another manifestation of the Mary-Sue/Gary-Stu syndrome which has the annoying quality of passing through sign-ups relatively unnoticed, although luckily, they can be caught and accused of powerplay/godmodding if they become too much of a problem. But as a prevention method, I'd like to ask that all of you who are reading this never resort to this 'helpfulness' measure. Sure, every character has the right to solve a problem occasionally (Provided that there are valid reasons for why they are capable of solving it) but an RP where every problem is solved with the flick of a wrist is a dull one indeed. -.-

Loki

November 5th, 2006, 03:28 PM

NPC Overload: Yeah, guilty as charged to this one. Sticking in a new NPC here and another there to prod the plot along might look like an easy solution, but the problem I've come across is that I'm in a situation where there are simply NPCs sticking out of every nook and cranny and you don't have a clue about what to do with em' all. This is mostly an RP master-type thing - as those usually end up having to carry the bulk of the NPCs - so as a piece of advice to anyone who wants to start their own RP: recycle. No, really, one well thought-out, multi-faceted character can quite well pull the weight of three simple ones created for the sake of convenience, and it will look a lot better from a plot perspective too. Not to mention that it's a lot less confusing. =3

The "Nice Character": I'm not sure if this has been mentioned already, but...have you ever come across the endlessly understanding, kind, and encouraging character who'll forgive everyone for everything every time without a shadow of a doubt but is always ready to kick evil butt? These would be the polar opposite of "troublemaker" characters, I guess, bordering on the Mary-Sue/Gary-Stu category but without the L33T battle skills of doom. I mean sure, getting along with the rest of the cast is all well and good, but let's draw the line somewhere, m'kay? No-one can always be complete and utter friends with everyone else in the group and always agree with everything they say, that's not human! <.< The worst thing is, these accursed leppers are really hard to pin down because they aren't really godmodding or powerplaying (Since they don't force others to like them or miraculously win every battle) and certainly aren't disrupting the plot. The fact that they are making you, personally, pull out your hair and scream "Can't you act normal even once?!" is unfortunately not a very good basis for kicking them out of the RP, so make sure to stamp these infernal pests out in the sign-up process. Trust me, it will save you a lot of frustrated hair-pulling later on.

Little Mr/Ms Helpful: Another peeve of mine, these are the insufferably perceptive characters who always know what must be done and always have the means to do it, typically followed by a miraculously expanding inventory of useful items. Pokémon KOed? Guess who's carrying a Max Revive. Rain? They've brought an umbrella. Mystery enemy working behind the scenes? Those incriminating documents (Complete with signatures, pictures, and detailed descriptions of all plans) just keep falling in their hands. World doomed to destruction in five seconds? They've got a time machine to make that five centuries. Regardless of the situation, Mr/Ms Helpful is on the job. This is another manifestation of the Mary-Sue/Gary-Stu syndrome which has the annoying quality of passing through sign-ups relatively unnoticed, although luckily, they can be caught and accused of powerplay/godmodding if they become too much of a problem. But as a prevention method, I'd like to ask that all of you who are reading this never resort to this 'helpfulness' measure. Sure, every character has the right to solve a problem occasionally (Provided that there are valid reasons for why they are capable of solving it) but an RP where every problem is solved with the flick of a wrist is a dull one indeed. -.-

Yeah that's been said, but that's something that should definetely be repeated. Definetely.

Guilty? Er, I might be. I'm not sure, but I do know that that is annoying. Where someone just happens to know or have or do just what's needed. There should be a rule on that, but that'd be extremely unfair.

NPC Overload actually sounds kind of foreign to me. I'm guilty of it, but honestly, when there are only two RPer's actually roleplaying, wouldn't you want to add a bunch of NPC's, so it doesn't get boring? It's only a problem for me if there are already enough characters in the first place. But to add, we're not the Pokemon Anime people's, we don't need a new character every new episode/post.

Solution Solved- Oops, Just Kidding!: Don't you just hate it when you think you've just solved somebody's problem, and you've gone through like 15 posts of fire and brimstone, and then all of the sudden, "Johnny started to cough violently again- for some reason, the water wasn't working!" Even if in your posts your character trudged like, 50 billion miles just to get the frigging water?

YoshiRiRu

November 13th, 2006, 08:56 PM

Nyah, excuses, excuses, excuses...yes, I'm familiar with that one. But my excuses are usually valid, like poofing off because of KH II. :O Seriously, though, I think most of the RPers around here have excused themselves many times over. It's human, but you ought to draw the line at the point where the whole RP is on the verge of extinction. I mean, at least have the decency to appoint someone else for ushering your character out of the plot's way if you can't be bothered to make the post yourself. xP Speaking of which, I seem to recall a certain RP we're both in suffering from that particular problem ATM. This wouldn't be you excusing yourself from the whole thing, would it? :P (Just kidding of course)

Aaaanyhow...about the level thing...meh, I tend to avoid that, personally. :\ Same goes with having set movesets for pokémon, I mean that's what the games are for, no wants to go through that tedious bussiness in an RP, right? I do make a point of making people stick to certain guidlines such as the type chart, trait effects learnsets (Ergo, what moves the pokémon actually can learn) and general statlines (No "Speed-trained" Snorlax outspeeding a Ninjask or other nonsense like that, thank you. <.<) but other than that I'm all for RPer liberty. Battles become dreadfully boring if all elements of creativity (E.g. Using the terrain to your advantage, applications of moves such as Rock Smash to counter a Rock Slide (Makes sense, ya' know =P) and suchlike) are taken out. I'd rather have it interesting than completely by the book. ^^

Oh, and on the fresh sins...

NPC Overload: Yeah, guilty as charged to this one. Sticking in a new NPC here and another there to prod the plot along might look like an easy solution, but the problem I've come across is that I'm in a situation where there are simply NPCs sticking out of every nook and cranny and you don't have a clue about what to do with em' all. This is mostly an RP master-type thing - as those usually end up having to carry the bulk of the NPCs - so as a piece of advice to anyone who wants to start their own RP: recycle. No, really, one well thought-out, multi-faceted character can quite well pull the weight of three simple ones created for the sake of convenience, and it will look a lot better from a plot perspective too. Not to mention that it's a lot less confusing. =3

The "Nice Character": I'm not sure if this has been mentioned already, but...have you ever come across the endlessly understanding, kind, and encouraging character who'll forgive everyone for everything every time without a shadow of a doubt but is always ready to kick evil butt? These would be the polar opposite of "troublemaker" characters, I guess, bordering on the Mary-Sue/Gary-Stu category but without the L33T battle skills of doom. I mean sure, getting along with the rest of the cast is all well and good, but let's draw the line somewhere, m'kay? No-one can always be complete and utter friends with everyone else in the group and always agree with everything they say, that's not human! <.< The worst thing is, these accursed leppers are really hard to pin down because they aren't really godmodding or powerplaying (Since they don't force others to like them or miraculously win every battle) and certainly aren't disrupting the plot. The fact that they are making you, personally, pull out your hair and scream "Can't you act normal even once?!" is unfortunately not a very good basis for kicking them out of the RP, so make sure to stamp these infernal pests out in the sign-up process. Trust me, it will save you a lot of frustrated hair-pulling later on.

Little Mr/Ms Helpful: Another peeve of mine, these are the insufferably perceptive characters who always know what must be done and always have the means to do it, typically followed by a miraculously expanding inventory of useful items. Pokémon KOed? Guess who's carrying a Max Revive. Rain? They've brought an umbrella. Mystery enemy working behind the scenes? Those incriminating documents (Complete with signatures, pictures, and detailed descriptions of all plans) just keep falling in their hands. World doomed to destruction in five seconds? They've got a time machine to make that five centuries. Regardless of the situation, Mr/Ms Helpful is on the job. This is another manifestation of the Mary-Sue/Gary-Stu syndrome which has the annoying quality of passing through sign-ups relatively unnoticed, although luckily, they can be caught and accused of powerplay/godmodding if they become too much of a problem. But as a prevention method, I'd like to ask that all of you who are reading this never resort to this 'helpfulness' measure. Sure, every character has the right to solve a problem occasionally (Provided that there are valid reasons for why they are capable of solving it) but an RP where every problem is solved with the flick of a wrist is a dull one indeed. -.-

GUILTY. Wow, I've done this a lot. I hate being the downer of a group, and I usually try to be the optimist. But I rarely take it too far, I like I know some people have the tendency to do. I usually back off, or at least have something negative come out of my mouth once in a while.

I've never really been like that, but I've RP'd with some people who have. This is especially annoying when you're a villian, and there's an uber helper on the good guy side (Really helpful people are ALWAYS good.) And just as you're about to succeed in your scheme..

DUN DUH DAAAAAAAAAA!

Captain helpy McHelperson, to the rescue.

Unimaginative Vocabulary: How often have you seen a paragraph like this?

"No" said Jon, walking to his sister. "'You're dying" said jon, walking away. "I have a potion." said Fred, walking to Jon's sister." "PLZ HALP!1" said Jon. "ONLY IF U HAVE ZENY ND A GUD ASL LOL!1ONE" said fred.

Said. Said. Said. Said. Said. Said. Doesn't matter if you're screaming, singing, crying, or whispering, said is all that comes out. I mean, how hard is it to choose a new word? Thesaurus.com for the win, ladies and gentlemen.

BAD GRAMMAR: This has been said over and over and over and over again. But please, for the love of sanity, just learn some basic english! Punctuation, capitalization, and anything like that make your posts look twenty times more professional than something just slapped together. No matter how amazing your sign-up may be, if it has bad grammar, odds are you'll be marked down heavily for that.

Alter Ego

November 18th, 2006, 10:02 AM

Guilty? Er, I might be. I'm not sure, but I do know that that is annoying. Where someone just happens to know or have or do just what's needed. There should be a rule on that, but that'd be extremely unfair.

Yeah, it's a bit too situation-dependent to make a general rule of it. I just stamp it as powerplay if I come across it and leave it at that.

Solution Solved- Oops, Just Kidding!: Don't you just hate it when you think you've just solved somebody's problem, and you've gone through like 15 posts of fire and brimstone, and then all of the sudden, "Johnny started to cough violently again- for some reason, the water wasn't working!" Even if in your posts your character trudged like, 50 billion miles just to get the frigging water?

Nyah, I haven't encountered this to any serious degree yet, but yeah, I can imagine what a pain that is to go through, what with having gone through single problem solving situations spanning a good seven pages. Just goes to show how a clueless N00B can ruin pages upon pages of quality RPing with a random two-liner. Life is so unfair in some ways. ~_~

Unimaginative Vocabulary: How often have you seen a paragraph like this?

"No" said Jon, walking to his sister. "'You're dying" said jon, walking away. "I have a potion." said Fred, walking to Jon's sister." "PLZ HALP!1" said Jon. "ONLY IF U HAVE ZENY ND A GUD ASL LOL!1ONE" said fred.

Said. Said. Said. Said. Said. Said. Doesn't matter if you're screaming, singing, crying, or whispering, said is all that comes out. I mean, how hard is it to choose a new word? Thesaurus.com for the win, ladies and gentlemen.

Amen to that, and lets not forget about 'thought' either. Thought, thought, thought, doesn't matter if the same friggen' thought is split into five friggen' pieces, there will be a 'thought' after each and every one of them. >_< Come on people, try contemplating, musing, planning, anything except for thought, thought, thought. It's not that hard. <.<

BAD GRAMMAR: This has been said over and over and over and over again. But please, for the love of sanity, just learn some basic english! Punctuation, capitalization, and anything like that make your posts look twenty times more professional than something just slapped together. No matter how amazing your sign-up may be, if it has bad grammar, odds are you'll be marked down heavily for that.
November 6th, 2006 03:28 AM

Again you've hit one of my main peeves. It's amazing how teenage people - even people born in the bloody US of A or UK, people who should know their native language - can't comprehend the function of the full stop, let alone paragraphing. Same goes for a stunning ignorance concerning words with similar spellings, such as 'manor' and 'manner', and even simple spelling. It's certain, okay? CERTAIN! NOT CERTIAN DARN YOU! HOW MANY TIMES WILL I HAVE TO POUND IT INTO YOUR THICK N00BISH SKULLS?! >_____<

Ehh...sorry about that, I've got a lot of pent up aggressions on this issue. ^^

Charon

November 18th, 2006, 10:43 AM

I agree with what's been said so far, but here's another three;

Where's the continuance?
Don't you just hate it in a roleplay when there's been a really maaaajor, emotionally significant scene, with insults throwing left right and centre, but a few posts later the character involved seemed to have forgotton about it completely and aren't emotionally affected at all? I don't know about you lot, but I've been in roleplays where my character's steel have really been tested emotionally, and they've left an arguement shaken and upset. However, the character she's been arguing with seems... completely fine. Happy again, even. Not just emotional things, too. One scen a character's limping, but then he scales a cliff or whatever... I mean, I know we all forget things some times, but often the continuance in roleplays is awful.

That's not how it's spelt!
I got SO angry at this. I'm European. There are many subtle spelling differences between US spelling and UK spelling. This has only happened once or twice, but one time I was signing up for a so-called 'advance' roleplay, and over and over again, I was told off for spelling colour 'wrong', and told I wasn't a good roleplayer for this. ¬¬;

Copy t3h master...
Again, only happened a few times, but I've seen kids making, literally, carbon copies of the roleplay creator's character.

Alter Ego

November 18th, 2006, 11:09 AM

Where's the continuance?
Don't you just hate it in a roleplay when there's been a really maaaajor, emotionally significant scene, with insults throwing left right and centre, but a few posts later the character involved seemed to have forgotton about it completely and aren't emotionally affected at all? I don't know about you lot, but I've been in roleplays where my character's steel have really been tested emotionally, and they've left an arguement shaken and upset. However, the character she's been arguing with seems... completely fine. Happy again, even. Not just emotional things, too. One scen a character's limping, but then he scales a cliff or whatever... I mean, I know we all forget things some times, but often the continuance in roleplays is awful.

Oh yes, I've seen this happen. Like this one time when my character had woken up on the wrong side of humanity and kind of ended up critisizing another one of everything from his height to his skill as a trainer, they were just about to have a dramatic showdown about it too, and then all of a sudden the random guy mounts his Dragonite and flies of somewhere. I mean, wtf? o.O On the other end of the spectrum, we've got the ridiculously emotive characters who take absolutely everything as a personal insult and the bear a grudge throughout the rest of the RP. Honestly, one time I didn't notice some minor remark one of this hyper-sensitives made to my character, which resulted in said character treating mine as his mortal enemy for the rest of the RP. Some people take these things so far that it's absolutely ridiculous. -.-

That's not how it's spelt!
I got SO angry at this. I'm European. There are many subtle spelling differences between US spelling and UK spelling. This has only happened once or twice, but one time I was signing up for a so-called 'advance' roleplay, and over and over again, I was told off for spelling colour 'wrong', and told I wasn't a good roleplayer for this. ¬¬;

Nyah, linguistic ignorance is a pain. I hope you did inform them that they weren't any good at language for saying such things. I would have. xD

Copy t3h master...
Again, only happened a few times, but I've seen kids making, literally, carbon copies of the roleplay creator's character.

Urgh, copycat RPers...don't even get me started about those good-for-nothing lowlife idea-stealing parasites. >.< I think something similar was brought up earlier, though, but even if it was it still bears repeating. I've also seen this kind of monkey see, monkey do mentality within the RP itself, even when I wasn't the RP master. My character employing some kind of special strategy or me taking up a more unusual style of description and then someone else, posting directly after me with a mutilated copy of whatever I'm doing. I've said it before and I'll say it again: be original, people! <.<

Loki

November 30th, 2006, 02:49 PM

That's not how it's spelt!
I got SO angry at this. I'm European. There are many subtle spelling differences between US spelling and UK spelling. This has only happened once or twice, but one time I was signing up for a so-called 'advance' roleplay, and over and over again, I was told off for spelling colour 'wrong', and told I wasn't a good roleplayer for this. ¬¬;

Nyah, linguistic ignorance is a pain. I hope you did inform them that they weren't any good at language for saying such things. I would have. xD

Ahhh, guilty as charged. But that's because I'm not entirely sure what's wrong and what's right in European and American combined. *shrugs* Usually once I'm told that I'm the one that's wrong, I'll stop and go sulk in a corner for a few hours. o o;; *has this 'need to be right' complex* But otherwise, I don't pursue it. I sometime's forget, though, color and colour hasn't really been one of the things that I go sulk on.

Rules & Stickies: I know I've brought this up before, but I decided to put it more in depth. Don't you just HATE it when someone comes around and it's blatantly obvious they haven't looked at any threads like the rules or this thread, or anything at all??? I find these threads extremely interesting, seeing what bugs other people and whether I do it or not. Is it just me?? And the rules! That should be the first thing you read on any forum! (That's why it bugs me when forums like, hide their rules.) It just makes me mad when I have to tell someone 'read the rules' or, 'I recommend you look at this thread before doing this or that again', because, honestly, they're at the top of the page for a very good reason.

YoshiRiRu

December 1st, 2006, 10:10 PM

Oversensitivity: I hate this. When people ask for advice, and then just totally throw a BF whenever you tell them something is wrong with their "precious" roleplay. This complaint is usually registered in either ALL CAPS or horendus speling and no grammer and speling loll!1 or SUMTIMZ BOFE!1

If you came for constructive criticism, you have to accept the criticism portion of that phrase.

Loki

December 2nd, 2006, 08:59 AM

Yes, I hate that too. It makes it hard not to flame them and say:

"GOD, IF YOU WANT ADVICE, NEXT TIME I'LL SHOVE IT DOWN YOUR THROAT."

>.< *huff puff*

Yeah. That bugs me a lot. It makes me feel like I wasted all my time, and somehow, it make's me feel as though I was just degraded, or insulted.

Nag Nag Whine Whine: I hate people who complain about the rule's being 'unfair' or, 'stupid' or, 'hard to follow'. Everyone else is following them just fine, why can't the whiney follow them too? This sometimes goes hand-in-hand with what Yoshi just said, because they just kind of brush off any advice that might help them follow the rules more easily.

Scarlet Weather

February 7th, 2007, 05:26 AM

I'm alive, and here's why!

Don't you hate it when someone ressurects a character from a clan/family/race that has been killed off, according to Canon? Seriously, that's dumb.

Don't move! It's a trap!

A variation on Helpy McHelper and Cat and Mouse, this character always seems to know when his allies are about to rush into a stake pit, for no apparent reason. May occasionally sacrifice himself, only to reveal that-surprise!- he is immunne to stakes!

I don't have to tell you everything...

A character, without necessarily god-moding, displays an attribute that wasn't given on their sign-up sheet without any training that would be needed to use the move. Yeah- I see this a lot, these days.

Loki

February 7th, 2007, 07:49 PM

I'm alive, and here's why!

Don't you hate it when someone ressurects a character from a clan/family/race that has been killed off, according to Canon? Seriously, that's dumb.

I plead not-guilty. I hate that as well, and I just don't like playing Canon characters, or, really, anything that has to do with canon characters.

Don't move! It's a trap!

A variation on Helpy McHelper and Cat and Mouse, this character always seems to know when his allies are about to rush into a stake pit, for no apparent reason. May occasionally sacrifice himself, only to reveal that-surprise!- he is immunne to stakes!

I've sort of said this already, so naturally, I plead not-guilty~

I don't have to tell you everything...

A character, without necessarily god-moding, displays an attribute that wasn't given on their sign-up sheet without any training that would be needed to use the move. Yeah- I see this a lot, these days.

I plead halfly-guilty. I usually explain a little training that's happened before, but I don't put it on my sign-up sheet. Why? Because usually, when I make the post, I'm too lazy to go and look at what abilities I've got on my sign-up sheet. :// *thats my BIGGEST fault. Laziness.*

Scarlet Weather

February 8th, 2007, 03:06 AM

I plead halfly-guilty. I usually explain a little training that's happened before, but I don't put it on my sign-up sheet. Why? Because usually, when I make the post, I'm too lazy to go and look at what abilities I've got on my sign-up sheet. :// *thats my BIGGEST fault. Laziness.*

OMGZ, you too? Wow, I'm not alone...

Shiney

February 8th, 2007, 09:43 AM

I don't have to tell you everything: Everyone's lazy to a certain extent.But yeah, I prefer to make my signup the "must know" info oif my character, and revewal the rest through actual RP'ing. But I view that as more of a different style. XD

I'm alive: Yeah, It can be invconveniant when they do it improperly, but when you consider it, totillitarian extinction is a very hard thing to do, thus, there's always room for elaboration, if you can do it decently. Just my opinion, I haven't actually done this myself, yet.

Alter Ego

February 8th, 2007, 09:54 AM

I concur, laziness is human. I just tend to leave the abilities side in my sign-up kind of vague so I'm left with a little room. I always justify the abilities in the actual post, though. :O

Amen on the canon thing. If you can't do canon right then don't do it at all, I say. xP

Light_Azumarill

February 8th, 2007, 10:08 AM

I'm alive, and here's why!

Don't you hate it when someone ressurects a character from a clan/family/race that has been killed off, according to Canon? Seriously, that's dumb.

Urghh! I hate it when people do that! T.T Especially when you make it clear that the RP is based on the canon. Thankfully I'm not guilty. ^^

The "Nice Character": I'm not sure if this has been mentioned already, but...have you ever come across the endlessly understanding, kind, and encouraging character who'll forgive everyone for everything every time without a shadow of a doubt but is always ready to kick evil butt? These would be the polar opposite of "troublemaker" characters, I guess, bordering on the Mary-Sue/Gary-Stu category but without the L33T battle skills of doom. I mean sure, getting along with the rest of the cast is all well and good, but let's draw the line somewhere, m'kay? No-one can always be complete and utter friends with everyone else in the group and always agree with everything they say, that's not human! <.< The worst thing is, these accursed leppers are really hard to pin down because they aren't really godmodding or powerplaying (Since they don't force others to like them or miraculously win every battle) and certainly aren't disrupting the plot. The fact that they are making you, personally, pull out your hair and scream "Can't you act normal even once?!" is unfortunately not a very good basis for kicking them out of the RP, so make sure to stamp these infernal pests out in the sign-up process. Trust me, it will save you a lot of frustrated hair-pulling later on.

Eep... have I done that? Perhaps once or twice. ^^; I think sometimes it's in an attempt to balance an RP's characters. So many RPs have too many characters that are all "I don't like to talk" and "I don't like anyone" that I think it's sometimes necessary to have a really nice person. I usually try and balance mine with some kind of fault or inner frustration though, they're never perfect little angels. (I hope! ^^)

Alter Ego

February 8th, 2007, 10:18 AM

Eep... have I done that? Perhaps once or twice. ^^; I think sometimes it's in an attempt to balance an RP's characters. So many RPs have too many characters that are all "I don't like to talk" and "I don't like anyone" that I think it's sometimes necessary to have a really nice person. I usually try and balance mine with some kind of fault or inner frustration though, they're never perfect little angels. (I hope! ^^)

Heh, relax, Melissa. You've never been guilty of that (at least to my knowledge). I know what you mean about the anti-socials (Guilty as charged to creating those xD) and I fully understand the need to create an agreeable character for balance. I draw the line at the point where said character agrees with everyone about everything even if that involves an internal controversy. xP Besides, most of these "nice people" have this peculiar niceness radar that lets them immediately tell who is a genuine good guy and who's a bad guy in disguise and act accordingly. Kind of like this one time I was playing one of the less nice characters (Can't recall the RP) and this one guy lunged at my char before my character had even spoken up and was all "I'll smite thee evil villain!". I was like "What? He hasn't even opened his mouth yet for pity's sake!". Yeah, not much fun. xP That's the kind of stupidity I'm talking about. >.< You certainly haven't exhibited that yet. ^-^

Fallen Angel_Messiah Of Black Roses

February 27th, 2007, 07:33 PM

I'm alive, and here's why!

Don't you hate it when someone ressurects a character from a clan/family/race that has been killed off, according to Canon? Seriously, that's dumb.

Guilty once, when I was obsessed with the Anime FMA; Full Metal Alchemist and I made my character ressurect his father through "Alchemy" which he failed and... well My character was practically Ed. Sad...
Don't move! It's a trap!

A variation on Helpy McHelper and Cat and Mouse, this character always seems to know when his allies are about to rush into a stake pit, for no apparent reason. May occasionally sacrifice himself, only to reveal that-surprise!- he is immunne to stakes!

I don't think so... I remember in one RP, (Like my first one) That the trap started and I made my character take most of the damage, ( It was like the walls shooting stakes) But he got like hurt actully...

I don't have to tell you everything...

A character, without necessarily god-moding, displays an attribute that wasn't given on their sign-up sheet without any training that would be needed to use the move. Yeah- I see this a lot, these days.

I plead! Guilty, same as the first, Obsessed with an Anime...

Just a question, Please be honest. Does this character Scream Cliche?

Name: AJ Valentine
Sex: Male
Age: 17
Description: AJ is a medium sized Hispanic teen, He's about Five Foot four and weighs around 130 something pounds. His eye's are a Cloudy blue that seems to reflect innocence, frailness yet his eyes are very deceiving and his teeth are nice and pearly, He is wearing an earing in his left ear, It's in the shape of... well a cross, a golden one with some rhinestones on them and has a tattoo of the cross on his forehead, it's a eeriely white tattoo making it look strange, but still well fitting. He wears tight Black leather pants that seem to shine slightly and a black shirt with a white cross and the words 'Judgment Day' on it. He wears onyx black boots with iron soles that seem to be good for kicking people. He wears a long white trench coat that goes down to just above his ankles with another cross on it, this time black. His hair is grayish white and styled in a medium sized ponytail.

Personality: AJ has a fixed personality, he is serious and strict in a situation but will also have a sense of humor to lighten up all the tense moments. Averagely he is a layed back calm kinda of guy, real outgoing. Even if you get on his nerves he will be willing to help you but if you really Piss him off your going to regret it, big time. So overall he's a layed back humorous yet strict and serious kind of guy. AJ sounds like your average everyday teen and doesn't care what anyone thinks, so he's never really depressed. So overall he's a layed back humorous yet strict and serious kind of guy, Don't get on his nerves and your fine and that concludes are little segment on his personality.

Akio123

February 27th, 2007, 08:01 PM

One thing I depise in RPers
RPers that join but never post: I am not saying that people should have their entire lives dedicated to an RP, but if youy don't really have the time to post and you know that(or know your current educational situation or have a carrer), then do not sign up. I mean yeah its a fun thing, but if you are going to impede the progress of the rp, then its unfair to everyone else and then the thread will die.

Always and Never

February 27th, 2007, 09:18 PM

People that switch from first person to third person.

I hate it when someone will post in first person and in the next few posts they'll be narrarating their character. It gets pretty annoying.

Random_Fan

February 27th, 2007, 09:58 PM

People that switch from first person to third person.

I hate it when someone will post in first person and in the next few posts they'll be narrarating their character. It gets pretty annoying.

XD I just did that! XP

No, but I had a reason for doing so. Either way, I'm guilty I guess. The reason was because I wanted to make it more easier for the RP creator since he was making a novelized version, and I noticed on my part that was novelized, there was still first person tenses.

Alter Ego

February 28th, 2007, 02:01 AM

Just a question, Please be honest. Does this character Scream Cliche?

Name: AJ Valentine
Sex: Male
Age: 17
Description: AJ is a medium sized Hispanic teen, He's about Five Foot four and weighs around 130 something pounds. His eye's are a Cloudy blue that seems to reflect innocence, frailness yet his eyes are very deceiving and his teeth are nice and pearly, He is wearing an earing in his left ear, It's in the shape of... well a cross, a golden one with some rhinestones on them and has a tattoo of the cross on his forehead, it's a eeriely white tattoo making it look strange, but still well fitting. He wears tight Black leather pants that seem to shine slightly and a black shirt with a white cross and the words 'Judgment Day' on it. He wears onyx black boots with iron soles that seem to be good for kicking people. He wears a long white trench coat that goes down to just above his ankles with another cross on it, this time black. His hair is grayish white and styled in a medium sized ponytail.

Personality: AJ has a fixed personality, he is serious and strict in a situation but will also have a sense of humor to lighten up all the tense moments. Averagely he is a layed back calm kinda of guy, real outgoing. Even if you get on his nerves he will be willing to help you but if you really Piss him off your going to regret it, big time. So overall he's a layed back humorous yet strict and serious kind of guy. AJ sounds like your average everyday teen and doesn't care what anyone thinks, so he's never really depressed. So overall he's a layed back humorous yet strict and serious kind of guy, Don't get on his nerves and your fine and that concludes are little segment on his personality.

Well, you asked for it. But I warn you: I can be a big meanie-butt when it comes to criticism, and I'm a particular nitpick with personalities. You have been warned, so read at your own peril. o.o

Cliché? Sort of, but the far louder scream here is 'internal contradiction'. To begin with, you're saying that he has a fixed personality (Which, in essence, means that he pretty much acts the same regardless of circumstance) yet you proceed to claim how he can be both strict and serious and laid back and humorous. This just doesn't work. A person can not really be serious and humorous at the same time, similarly strict and laid back don't really mix, yet you claim that his personality is fixed (as opposed to shifting) which implies that both things should be true at the same time. Obviously, we have a paradox here. :\ Also, calm one moment and frothing mad the next is the mark of an unstable personality. Instead, you could say that he acts calm, bottling up his anger, which would also explain the huge outbursts you're hinting at here.

My main gripe here is that this guy seems to lack any real flaws. I mean, serious, unbothered, and strict but also humorous and oh-so willing to help everyone out...what's his weakpoint? (And don't even start with the righteous fury since he bottles it up most of the time and it might even be argued as a good side, especially since you didn't give any indication of what 'pisses him off' as you say) I'd like to see something that establishes him a bit more firmly as human and a bit less of that optionality in his personality (As it is, he can be pretty much adapted to the situation and serve as both the funny guy, the serious leader and goodness knows what else). Just chart out a clear good point/bad point relation rather than wavering in-between and don't be afraid to have a flawed character, they tend to be much more fun to read about.

Finally, that personality is repetitively described. You're basically yammering on about the same thing multiple times, which kind of gives me the impression that you are trying to make it look larger than it is. I mean, just look at this:

AJ has a fixed personality, he is serious and strict in a situation but will also have a sense of humor to lighten up all the tense moments. Averagely he is a layed back calm kinda of guy, real outgoing. Even if you get on his nerves he will be willing to help you but if you really Piss him off your going to regret it, big time. So overall he's a layed back humorous yet strict and serious kind of guy. AJ sounds like your average everyday teen and doesn't care what anyone thinks, so he's never really depressed. So overall he's a layed back humorous yet strict and serious kind of guy, Don't get on his nerves and your fine and that concludes are little segment on his personality

Bolding done by me. Each of the bolded parts is essentially explaining the same thing, so why oh why must your do it three times? Usually, people tend to catch on at the first or second try. As a side note: I notice that your characters always seem to be named AJ. In fact, you do it so often that it's almost become a cliché for you, so try to experiment around with other names for a change, m'kay? Also, AJ is an abbrevation so you might want to state the real names behind it. (Please tell me they're not Ash Junior)

So yeah, let's just say that if this was a sign-up submitted to one of my RPs, I'd decline it in its current state. Do you have a history field to go with this? History and personality really go hand in hand.

Well, like I said: I warned you.

Moving on...the switch of tenses is just...bleah. If you want to help someone with a fanfic version then send that to the writer guy, but whatever you do don't go switching styles in the middle of an RP. It's incredibly annoying, not to mention disruptive for the clarity of the posts. I'm opposed to first person narrative in RPs in general, because 1) most of the people who do it don't have a clue about how to write good first person 2) the horde of 'I's just makes it a bother to follow who's doing what, when, where, and why. Besides, it's hard to remember characters' names when they're all just 'I'. xP

Finally, about this one:

RPers that join but never post: I am not saying that people should have their entire lives dedicated to an RP, but if youy don't really have the time to post and you know that(or know your current educational situation or have a carrer), then do not sign up. I mean yeah its a fun thing, but if you are going to impede the progress of the rp, then its unfair to everyone else and then the thread will die.

Agreed, hence why I'm so picky about what I join and drop out only when real life forces my hand or the person in charge of the RP does something inexcusable like godmodding or powerplaying (or sanctioning it). My reaction would be much the same if someone did the same to one of my characters as they did to Mika's - i.e. tried to stick him/her in a fanfic - but thankfully I haven't had to go through that yet. xP

Oh, and I do hope that this has been mentioned before, but one thing that really drives me up the walls is:

Pictures in RPs

And by this I don't mean just ripping off animenation because you can't be bothered to write up your appearance (which is bad enough), but also pictures within the RP itself. Such as, a person who looked like this [Insert crappy sprite or ripped anime picture here] entered the room.

...

WTFudge? An RP is a piece of writing not the amateur spriters' club. If you can't describe what you need to get described in writing then you should seriously reconsider hosting an RP to begin with. Pictures in RP posts just look horribly cluttering and out of place and make the whole thing look like some kindergarten kid's collage assignment (Sorry, but it's true). The moment I see a picture in an RP post I either demand it to be removed (if it's my RP) or just plain stop reading. xP

Okay, first official peeve is the standardised characters in RP's being used and reused over and over again. I'm not pointing the finger at anyone, but I've joined about three to four RP's in the last fortnight or so and some of the other members who have also joined in the same RP, use exactly the same character. And the thing is, they're continuing to use the same character over and over again, without making any improvements or changes to their profile. The only solution I can come up with if I'm ever in an RP with a profile I've seen three or more times before, is that I'll just withdraw from the RP or decline them immediately.

The only other thing that's been bothering me lately is the lack of good spelling, grammar, and vocabulary. The funny thing is, most of the people who I see who can’t spell or construct proper words or sentences are those who reuse old and unchanged character profiles. And I can tolerate members who have difficulty with English if they’re from another country or are of a non-English background, but for those who are born and raised in English-speaking countries, there’s not much of an excuse. I mean, these people sign up for RP after RP after RP and most of their posts are accumulated in the role playing forums, but I’ve never understood why, after all their experience in role playing or lack thereof, the quality of their posts never seem to improve. However, the ironic thing is, if I were to establish a more mature and literate RP and only accept members who are above adequate in the English language, then more likely than not, that RP would die after a few days or would not start at all. It’s because most good role players lose interest easily, and those who are not as competent, are generally more interested and involved in the RP, thus carrying it on.

It's a dangerous cycle where good role players are slowly being weeded out. I'm not saying that all RP's are like this, but I have seen a few recently. It's just that, some of the more illiterate role players continue to role play and become accustomed to doing so in such a manner. They don't care about improving since they're being accepted in almost every RP they sign up to. And for the few RP's that they are declined from, the RP is quickly disbanded or loses interest among good role players.

Alter Ego

April 9th, 2007, 05:53 AM

Okay, first official peeve is the standardised characters in RP's being used and reused over and over again. I'm not pointing the finger at anyone, but I've joined about three to four RP's in the last fortnight or so and some of the other members who have also joined in the same RP, use exactly the same character. And the thing is, they're continuing to use the same character over and over again, without making any improvements or changes to their profile. The only solution I can come up with if I'm ever in an RP with a profile I've seen three or more times before, is that I'll just withdraw from the RP or decline them immediately.

That is the complete and utter divine truth right there. Recycled characters generally equal suckadelicness. I mean sure, if it's a character with a long and complex history - created through actual RPing - which has been developed in the process then that's awesome, but if it's just the same, lousy, slapdash character (Not pointing any fingers here either...but you people ought to know who you are and feel deep shame over it. xP) with a maximum edit of two sentences to make it fit some kind of plot requirement or the other then I just decline those right off the bat. And yes, I do notice when people do that too, although fortunately none of those have tried to join any of my RPs. It's sad, but some characters I've seen could really be declined by the name field already. Innovation doesn't hurt, people. That's why I've tried to cover the whole spectrum from annoyingly cheerful and upbeat to dark and angsty. Oh, and in both genders too. Really, I warmly recommend trying that at least once to all RPers around. RPing is no fun if you don't push your limits. ^-^

The only other thing that's been bothering me lately is the lack of good spelling, grammar, and vocabulary. The funny thing is, most of the people who I see who can’t spell or construct proper words or sentences are those who reuse old and unchanged character profiles. And I can tolerate members who have difficulty with English if they’re from another country or are of a non-English background, but for those who are born and raised in English-speaking countries, there’s not much of an excuse. I mean, these people sign up for RP after RP after RP and most of their posts are accumulated in the role playing forums, but I’ve never understood why, after all their experience in role playing or lack thereof, the quality of their posts never seem to improve. However, the ironic thing is, if I were to establish a more mature and literate RP and only accept members who are above adequate in the English language, then more likely than not, that RP would die after a few days or would not start at all. It’s because most good role players lose interest easily, and those who are not as competent, are generally more interested and involved in the RP, thus carrying it on.

I am deeply hurt by your insinuation that all good RPers lose interest quickly. Are you saying I'm not a good RPer, boy?! xO I never quit an RP unless either A) Real-life issues really force my hand and I have no chance of attending, B) No-one else posts and the thread dies, or C) The RP master behaves in a way that I can't tolerate (Typically, blatant powerplay or godmodding, serious neglect of any RPers except their own little clique, or letting the whole thing go completely out of control). I would also like to remark that I've had the pleasure of RPing with several good and very devoted RPers who really do their best to keep the RP alive and well. (I basically count all the people left in my Ancient Dynasty RP into this category. Sticking with the same RP for over a year through mass absences and RL issues is definitely dedication in my book.) So yeah, don't paint everyone with the same brush. Some RPers are like that, but it's not a universal thing by any means, which is why I still love RPing here. :3 You know what I find ironic, though? A lot of native speakers on these forums are actually worse at English than ones who have studied it as a foreign language. Now that's just plain lazy. If I managed to learn through a volatile combination of computer games, bad TV and English lessons then the native folks should be able to do a bit better than 'hipplz hwo r U????". Really, every time a native speaker person posts that way a kitten dies. -.-

It's a dangerous cycle where good role players are slowly being weeded out. I'm not saying that all RP's are like this, but I have seen a few recently. It's just that, some of the more illiterate role players continue to role play and become accustomed to doing so in such a manner. They don't care about improving since they're being accepted in almost every RP they sign up to. And for the few RP's that they are declined from, the RP is quickly disbanded or loses interest among good role players.

O.O

If I weren't such a scrupulous (and heterosexual) person I'd give you a deathgrip of a hug right about now. Seriously, I thought I was the only person around to think like this. I've seen a ton of good RPs underperform because the RP masters let through terribly sloppy sign-ups that I would have stamped with 'fail' at a glance. The usual argument I hear is: "Everyone's got to start somewhere". But really, like you said: these people aren't there to 'make a start'; they're just plodding on the spot because they keep getting away with it. Around here, the 'somewhere' where people who can't manage four lines of coherent english need to start at is called primary school. This easy acceptance also leaves some clearly mediocre RPers with the misguided impression that they're awesome. I dunno' if it's just me being a crude person, but I don't think RP masters should hesitate to bring down the hammer when they see sloppy profiles. If something is wrong with a profile then demand edits, if they can't manage it then fail them. It's that simple, and yes, belive it or not there's actually a fair base of talented, literate RPers on these forums, people, you don't need to settle for the next best thing. I never did and my RPs always end up crowded anyway.

I must say, that post made my day. Yay for non-sucky RPing! :3

parallelzero

April 9th, 2007, 07:24 AM

That is the complete and utter divine truth right there. Recycled characters generally equal suckadelicness. I mean sure, if it's a character with a long and complex history - created through actual RPing - which has been developed in the process then that's awesome, but if it's just the same, lousy, slapdash character (Not pointing any fingers here either...but you people ought to know who you are and feel deep shame over it. xP) with a maximum edit of two sentences to make it fit some kind of plot requirement or the other then I just decline those right off the bat. And yes, I do notice when people do that too, although fortunately none of those have tried to join any of my RPs. It's sad, but some characters I've seen could really be declined by the name field already. Innovation doesn't hurt, people. That's why I've tried to cover the whole spectrum from annoyingly cheerful and upbeat to dark and angsty. Oh, and in both genders too. Really, I warmly recommend trying that at least once to all RPers around. RPing is no fun if you don't push your limits. ^-^

I am deeply hurt by your insinuation that all good RPers lose interest quickly. Are you saying I'm not a good RPer, boy?! xO I never quit an RP unless either A) Real-life issues really force my hand and I have no chance of attending, B) No-one else posts and the thread dies, or C) The RP master behaves in a way that I can't tolerate (Typically, blatant powerplay or godmodding, serious neglect of any RPers except their own little clique, or letting the whole thing go completely out of control). I would also like to remark that I've had the pleasure of RPing with several good and very devoted RPers who really do their best to keep the RP alive and well. (I basically count all the people left in my Ancient Dynasty RP into this category. Sticking with the same RP for over a year through mass absences and RL issues is definitely dedication in my book.) So yeah, don't paint everyone with the same brush. Some RPers are like that, but it's not a universal thing by any means, which is why I still love RPing here. :3 You know what I find ironic, though? A lot of native speakers on these forums are actually worse at English than ones who have studied it as a foreign language. Now that's just plain lazy. If I managed to learn through a volatile combination of computer games, bad TV and English lessons then the native folks should be able to do a bit better than 'hipplz hwo r U????". Really, every time a native speaker person posts that way a kitten dies. -.-

O.O

If I weren't such a scrupulous (and heterosexual) person I'd give you a deathgrip of a hug right about now. Seriously, I thought I was the only person around to think like this. I've seen a ton of good RPs underperform because the RP masters let through terribly sloppy sign-ups that I would have stamped with 'fail' at a glance. The usual argument I hear is: "Everyone's got to start somewhere". But really, like you said: these people aren't there to 'make a start'; they're just plodding on the spot because they keep getting away with it. Around here, the 'somewhere' where people who can't manage four lines of coherent english need to start at is called primary school. This easy acceptance also leaves some clearly mediocre RPers with the misguided impression that they're awesome. I dunno' if it's just me being a crude person, but I don't think RP masters should hesitate to bring down the hammer when they see sloppy profiles. If something is wrong with a profile then demand edits, if they can't manage it then fail them. It's that simple, and yes, belive it or not there's actually a fair base of talented, literate RPers on these forums, people, you don't need to settle for the next best thing. I never did and my RPs always end up crowded anyway.

I must say, that post made my day. Yay for non-sucky RPing! :3

The main problem right now is that we're starting to come to a point in which it's hard to gather a group of RPers who have even an inkling of talent. I've been RPing here for three years, and at one point a high post quality was present wherever you went. Over the past year or so, however, quality has severely declined. I take some responsibility for this, as I could have devised methods for improvement long ago. Some of the blame lands on the bad RPers themselves, though. I know I reject almost ever person with little talent from my RPs, but with the RP masters of "this generation", they just accept almost everyone who applies unless they don't like someone. By doing this, they make the RPers think it's okay to post like that, and in turn they continue; sometimes getting worse.

As for that comment on RPers losing interest; it's true. I don't know how many RPs I've started in the last year that have just mysteriously died due to people refraining from posting without a word to me. It's pathetic. If you aren't going to have enough interest to stay in the RP, why bother signing up?

For the record, Jyukai and I have been trying to think up methods of improving the overall quality, but we have yet to stumble upon anything that would actually work without being too strict. If you have suggestions, you're welcome to PM one of us with your thoughts.

Shiney

April 9th, 2007, 09:43 AM

The main problem right now is that we're starting to come to a point in which it's hard to gather a group of RPers who have even an inkling of talent. I've been RPing here for three years, and at one point a high post quality was present wherever you went. Over the past year or so, however, quality has severely declined. I take some responsibility for this, as I could have devised methods for improvement long ago. Some of the blame lands on the bad RPers themselves, though. I know I reject almost ever person with little talent from my RPs, but with the RP masters of "this generation", they just accept almost everyone who applies unless they don't like someone. By doing this, they make the RPers think it's okay to post like that, and in turn they continue; sometimes getting worse.

As for that comment on RPers losing interest; it's true. I don't know how many RPs I've started in the last year that have just mysteriously died due to people refraining from posting without a word to me. It's pathetic. If you aren't going to have enough interest to stay in the RP, why bother signing up?

For the record, Jyukai and I have been trying to think up methods of improving the overall quality, but we have yet to stumble upon anything that would actually work without being too strict. If you have suggestions, you're welcome to PM one of us with your thoughts.

Amen to that, as for the the loss of interest, I think it's primarily due to people's interests changing, or their perception of what the RP would be like not olding up to the real thing. Still, it's a problem.

And I've been doing the same, as un-official as I am. But I think that the problem is, we simply can't force people to work on quality. We need to find a way to make them want quality. [/2cents]

Alter Ego

April 9th, 2007, 12:03 PM

The main problem right now is that we're starting to come to a point in which it's hard to gather a group of RPers who have even an inkling of talent. I've been RPing here for three years, and at one point a high post quality was present wherever you went. Over the past year or so, however, quality has severely declined. I take some responsibility for this, as I could have devised methods for improvement long ago. Some of the blame lands on the bad RPers themselves, though. I know I reject almost ever person with little talent from my RPs, but with the RP masters of "this generation", they just accept almost everyone who applies unless they don't like someone. By doing this, they make the RPers think it's okay to post like that, and in turn they continue; sometimes getting worse.

Yes, I see what you mean about new RP masters. Tsk, they're so eager to get started that they don't mind the quality. Heck, the really new ones probably don't even have a proper measure for it and honestly can't tell, and as people can't really judge how good their RPing is from anything but the responses they get, it's a vicious circle. I think you've struck the centre of the argument here.

As for that comment on RPers losing interest; it's true. I don't know how many RPs I've started in the last year that have just mysteriously died due to people refraining from posting without a word to me. It's pathetic. If you aren't going to have enough interest to stay in the RP, why bother signing up?

I've lost count of how many times I've thought that last sentence in this quote (and wanted to scream it at certain forumites 'til I'm foaming at the mouth <<). Seriously, joining and then just poofing without a word is one of the most rude and disrespectful things you can do to an RP master. At the very least people should have the decency to provide a proper explanation for their decisions. Oddly enough, I've only had this problem in one of my own RPs. Lucky me. :3

For the record, Jyukai and I have been trying to think up methods of improving the overall quality, but we have yet to stumble upon anything that would actually work without being too strict. If you have suggestions, you're welcome to PM one of us with your thoughts.

Nyu, I'll keep that in mind. I have couple of ideas floating about in my head but I've yet to phrase them so that people can understand what the heck I'm going on about. xD But yeah, glad to see our mods are taking this seriously. Just a couple of things I'd like to throw out for general discussion: how about a kind of discussion thread for just RPing in general rather than plots in particular? You know, characters, plot development, writing technique...stuff like that. I think the Discussion Thread was a great initiative, but it's exclusively for plots while this thread is for 'what not to do's. It sort of leaves out a lot of the 'what to do's that would benefit the weaker RPers. Also, maybe some kind of organized offering of RP tutoring? You know, kind of like the old 'Adopt an RPer' thread? Of course I'm not so optimistic as to think that everyone who needs it is going to ask for help, but there are some who are just genuinely inexperienced and more than willing to learn. Offering them a hand might not be such a bad way to start tackling the issue. And if it fails...well, it's not like it's such a huge investment so losses are small. Also, some up-to-date guides would be cool. Yeah, shutting up about that now. I might get back to it by PM once I come up with a more developed idea. :3

Amen to that, as for the the loss of interest, I think it's primarily due to people's interests changing, or their perception of what the RP would be like not olding up to the real thing. Still, it's a problem.

And I've been doing the same, as un-official as I am. But I think that the problem is, we simply can't force people to work on quality. We need to find a way to make them want quality. [/2cents]

Not just that, we need to make them realize what quality is. You can't desire something you have no picture of. Mediocrity is so rampant that it's threatening to become a new definition for good, and that's one scary thought. :\

Loki

April 9th, 2007, 02:36 PM

WARNING: ESSAY AHEAD.

*meep!* All these big posts are frightening me. >.< I feel kind of apart of the blame as well, I plead guilty of losing interest in roleplay's, but you don't have to say it so...meanly! ;A; -shot- No I totally understand. I know how it feels as well, even though I do it myself.

My Reasons for Dropping
A little defendant for the people who drop roleplay’s. I think that everyone who signs-up for an RP, had interest in that RP. But for me, when time goes on, sometimes the RP just goes in circle’s, because nobody’s bold enough to make something happen. Or maybe it’s just that some actions of other characters bother me enough so that I lose all interest in even wanting to be around their character. And one thing that bothers me the most: Same faces. PC’s Rping section consists of the same people, over, and over, and over again. I do love Rping with my friends and such, but, after seeing the same style, same layout of character, I just can’t help but feel completely unmotivated to interact with the character in question. (I know I’m being hypocritical, but let’s ignore that fact for the rest of the post so we can just get this over with. XP)

RP Masters
I, as an RP master, usually dislike accepting people I know who may have a good sign-up, but honestly can't RP in actuality at all. D: I know that I dislike declining people, because it’s just not a happy thing, but accepting people left and right is worse then just declining someone. I think you have to really think about whether or not this person can really commit. And at this point, I don’t start my own RP’s anymore, because I know that I, personally, can’t seem to commit to my own RP’s.

Quality of Posts and Sign-ups
But what I'd really like to address is the quality of RPing lately. I sure as heck wasn't here for those 'golden days' that everyone here seems to so enjoy talking about, but I know that I've seen WAY better days then this. I think we all hold relatively similar views on this subject, we just don’t voice it. (I don’t because I’m afraid I’ll offend someone…) But I do agree that people who accept under-average sign-ups are just promoting low-quality Rping. But I think it’d be unfair and too restrictive if people were made to accept only good quality sign-ups, because newer Rper’s would never get the chance to progress in their learning, and would simply be dropped on the spot.

Solutions
I've discussed with Origin about making a sort of RPing school, or an RP to help teach the less experienced RPer's, but honestly, it all comes down to whether or not these RPer's would join or not. :/ And judging by some of the more active RPer's, well... I highly doubt they would consider themselves un-experienced enough. D:

I know for sure that I'd join to learn a little more, but I don't think that just me would be a very successful place, and I sure as hell don't want everyone hanging over my shoulder pointing out every little mistake of mine. D:

You haven't the slightest idea how much I wish and wish and wish that we could just do a thread that deals on the styles of every roleplayer. D: Like, a thread that would just be there so people can put in their opinions about other people's roleplaying, and what they could really work on. But I can't help but feel an ominous preminition that that's just not going to work out okay, especially since some people might word it in offending ways. >.<

Discussion Thread
I like that idea, but it only focuses generally, and doesn’t pinpoint what one certain member needs to work on. I mean, it could be only one person in the entire Rping population who needs help on say, developing more original characters, but they may never even stumble upon the page, or even consider that the point is directed at them.

Adopt a Roleplayer
I’ve had some people ask me to do something similar to ‘adopt a roleplayer’ with them, and I’ve agreed. I have to say though, it was not an enjoyable experience. No matter how many times I would tell them to improve on something, the next post they made, well. It was not improved. And then, sometimes I would get roleplayer’s who were absolutely fine, and they’d be insisting on critique, and I simply can give them the critique they need. It also ate up my time, so I personally didn’t enjoy doing the adoption, but I would certainly take the time to look into the idea if any Rper’s would be willing be adopter’s. (But, that would depend on my idea of whether or not that adopter would be suited for adopting.)

@AE: If you do get a good idea, PM me first. ;3 –shot-

Whole thing in a nutshell: I agree 100%-ly to what Phanima is saying, because it’s 100% true. :/

Disclaimer: I'm not pointing ANY fingers here. Well, I pointed a finger at myself, but it's not like you should care. D:

Alter Ego

April 18th, 2007, 05:46 AM

Hah! You all thought I had gone and forgotten about this thread, didn't you? Didn't you? *Pokes* Well, no such luck for you. xD

My Reasons for Dropping
A little defendant for the people who drop roleplay’s. I think that everyone who signs-up for an RP, had interest in that RP. But for me, when time goes on, sometimes the RP just goes in circle’s, because nobody’s bold enough to make something happen. Or maybe it’s just that some actions of other characters bother me enough so that I lose all interest in even wanting to be around their character. And one thing that bothers me the most: Same faces. PC’s Rping section consists of the same people, over, and over, and over again. I do love Rping with my friends and such, but, after seeing the same style, same layout of character, I just can’t help but feel completely unmotivated to interact with the character in question. (I know I’m being hypocritical, but let’s ignore that fact for the rest of the post so we can just get this over with. XP)

That's a good point about the 'same faces' thing. I mean, some are skilled enough to make very different characters and even narrate differently to accommodate them, but eventually everything becomes 'been there; done that'. Still, all it really takes is one or a few new ones to stir things up and make an RP that much more interesting. *Sigh* We really do need new blood here.

I know what you mean. Being nagged is never much fun, even - or rather, particularly - when you know it's justified.

RP Masters
I, as an RP master, usually dislike accepting people I know who may have a good sign-up, but honestly can't RP in actuality at all. D: I know that I dislike declining people, because it’s just not a happy thing, but accepting people left and right is worse then just declining someone. I think you have to really think about whether or not this person can really commit. And at this point, I don’t start my own RP’s anymore, because I know that I, personally, can’t seem to commit to my own RP’s.

Kind of makes it hard for people to prove that they've changed, but I relate to the feeling. Sometimes I've even found myself going 'please don't try to sign up, please don't try to sign up' in my head when I see certain people watching my RPs. I know it's mean, but there are some people you just know are going to do all the wrong things and are most likely never going to produce an acceptable profile. -.- I'd go off on a rant about RPing commitment too, but I think you all know my feelings on that subject by now. xD

Quality of Posts and Sign-ups
But what I'd really like to address is the quality of RPing lately. I sure as heck wasn't here for those 'golden days' that everyone here seems to so enjoy talking about, but I know that I've seen WAY better days then this. I think we all hold relatively similar views on this subject, we just don’t voice it. (I don’t because I’m afraid I’ll offend someone…) But I do agree that people who accept under-average sign-ups are just promoting low-quality Rping. But I think it’d be unfair and too restrictive if people were made to accept only good quality sign-ups, because newer Rper’s would never get the chance to progress in their learning, and would simply be dropped on the spot.

And here's another big point. If we let them in, they'll think they're doing fine, if we don't then they don't have a chance to improve. And of course, telling people 'Yeah, I'll accept you but you should really improve' probably isn't going to go over well. >_< I've been known to critsize posts that go blatantly below quality limits or conflict with the setting or logic and people hate me enough for that. Just imagine what they'd think of someone constantly on their case. .___.

Solutions
I've discussed with Origin about making a sort of RPing school, or an RP to help teach the less experienced RPer's, but honestly, it all comes down to whether or not these RPer's would join or not. :/ And judging by some of the more active RPer's, well... I highly doubt they would consider themselves un-experienced enough. D:

I know for sure that I'd join to learn a little more, but I don't think that just me would be a very successful place, and I sure as hell don't want everyone hanging over my shoulder pointing out every little mistake of mine. D:

Yeah, I vaguely remember this idea from that other thread and the percieved experience issue as well. Personally, I think the best shot would be trying to promote some kind of 'everyone learns' image. I mean, you said you wanted to learn a little more, I'd like to learn more too (I know I have my weakpoints in RPing, but I never ever get feedback on them and it's a bit too awkward to just badger someone into giving criticism >_<) and I'm sure that goes for a lot of experienced RPers here. If people who are obviously not N00Bs (Or am I being too presumptious in thinking of myself as such? xD) get into it, it certainly couldn't be seen as 'just a N00B thing'. Dunno' how many would be up for it, but meh...it's just the way I see it. And it's true about the critcism. It would take some kind of system to regulate it so people don't go overboard, especially the kind who like to feel smart by echoing what someone else has already said.

You haven't the slightest idea how much I wish and wish and wish that we could just do a thread that deals on the styles of every roleplayer. D: Like, a thread that would just be there so people can put in their opinions about other people's roleplaying, and what they could really work on. But I can't help but feel an ominous preminition that that's just not going to work out okay, especially since some people might word it in offending ways. >.<

Somehow I feel very pointed out by that particular 'some people'. But yes, I see what you're saying, a thread like that would have to have really tight discipline on manners, both ways, or we'd have critics and RPers trying to tear each others' throats out before you know it. D:

Still, it would be worth a shot, I think. Odds are that it would become a playground for seasoned RPers first, anyway, since they're the ones who usually read these threads. And let's face it, I just love the idea of a thread where I could babble on about style, narrative technique and all that Grimer with people who actually give a damn. xD

Discussion Thread
I like that idea, but it only focuses generally, and doesn’t pinpoint what one certain member needs to work on. I mean, it could be only one person in the entire Rping population who needs help on say, developing more original characters, but they may never even stumble upon the page, or even consider that the point is directed at them.

True, but I thought it would be a logical first step. While you might not be able to get a complete personal analysis out of a thread like that, it could at least yield some general things (always a start) and who knows? It might enocurage people to ask for more in-depth stuff. After all, it's not like it would be explicitly forbidden to go into personal detail, even if it wouldn't be the main focus of the topic. ^^ At this point, I think the important thing is to start getting something done (Besides discussing matters, that is) to counteract this decline. It's just a starting idea, anyway, and could certainly be devleloped as necessary or just plain replaced once a better one comes along.

Adopt a Roleplayer
I’ve had some people ask me to do something similar to ‘adopt a roleplayer’ with them, and I’ve agreed. I have to say though, it was not an enjoyable experience. No matter how many times I would tell them to improve on something, the next post they made, well. It was not improved. And then, sometimes I would get roleplayer’s who were absolutely fine, and they’d be insisting on critique, and I simply can give them the critique they need. It also ate up my time, so I personally didn’t enjoy doing the adoption, but I would certainly take the time to look into the idea if any Rper’s would be willing be adopter’s. (But, that would depend on my idea of whether or not that adopter would be suited for adopting.)

That's very true. Teaching takes more than just skills, unfortunately. Like a saintly tolerance for people who just don't get it and a way to get your message through. :O I'd volunteer to give it a shot, but with my current timetable beings what it is, I just don't have the time. Besides, my nerves are always a bit stretched after studying, not to mention that I'm a prick about grammar and spelling, so I'd probably be a grouchy adopter anyway. .__.

@AE: If you do get a good idea, PM me first. ;3 –shot-

Lol, I'll keep that in mind. No gems this far, though. I'll give you a call if I find any.[/Lame Crystal phone conversation reference] :3

Bluehawk Dustorm

June 8th, 2007, 05:35 AM

That's a good point about the 'same faces' thing. I mean, some are skilled enough to make very different characters and even narrate differently to accommodate them, but eventually everything becomes 'been there; done that'. Still, all it really takes is one or a few new ones to stir things up and make an RP that much more interesting. *Sigh* We really do need new blood here.

You rang? :P

One thing that kind of annoys me personally is the overzealous antigodmodder. I will admit that I have, occasionally, gone a little overboard in RP fights. The last RP board I actively participated in (for five good years) had a really strong Freestyle PvP culture, and most of the RPers there tended to have one or two main characters that they would use. As such these fights and tournaments became "canon" of sorts for our already well-adventured RP characters. And so, naturally, I allowed Bluehawk's powers to develop some.

The thing is, eventually I actually came to expect a [i]challenge from these fights. Every one of Hawk's abilities was dogged with SOME kind of weakness (and not something stupid like "ONLY A LIGHTSABAR CAN DE-FEET HIM LOLZ", I mean strategic weaknesses that just about anyone can exploit IF they're clever) and every move I made ensured that Hawk's abilities were used to their maximum efficiency. But what happened? Because I contrasted with a bunch of people who do nothing but hurl a bunch of random attacks at their opponants and hope for the best (and I don't go for that, I try to actually CHALLENGE people and have FUN with a battle, not "oh guess i use this move next m i doin it rite?") I was suddenly branded a godmodder and mocked out by several of the mods when I attempted to explain my case, not to mention threatened with banination with I objected to said mocking.

Yeah, I'm still kinda sore 'bout that one. Once upon a time the only real way to offend via godmodding was by controlling someone else's character (including closed-ended attacks) or occasionally by having omni-powers such as shields that nobody can get through.

Interestingly enough I've just heard a very similar complaint from one of my friends - that a lot of people complain that their attacks are being evaded too much but they don't actually put in any effort to ensuring that they hit an agile foe or one who can defend against their attacks. A fight isn't just "lol attacks lol"! It's about constantly finding new and improved ways to implement one's abilities effectively against another's! Ugh.

...So yeah anyways, heads up. If you're ever in an RP fight with me, perhaps not so much with my Light-side avatar here as he's pretty inexperienced at the moment, but later on especially, I will expect a certain level of effort before I begin yielding any decent hits. :P

Chikara

June 8th, 2007, 06:22 AM

That's not how it's spelt!
I got SO angry at this. I'm European. There are many subtle spelling differences between US spelling and UK spelling. This has only happened once or twice, but one time I was signing up for a so-called 'advance' roleplay, and over and over again, I was told off for spelling colour 'wrong', and told I wasn't a good roleplayer for this. ¬¬;

If it still matters to anything going on, just tell them that they're spelling it wrong. We Americans altered English, and were too lazy to put that 'all too important' U in there. So we say color instead of it. Don't worry, you're saying it completely correctly, it's we Americans who are arrogant enough to not know that, and think we're right all the time and everyone else is wrong. ('cept for me XD)

You rang? :P

One thing that kind of annoys me personally is the overzealous antigodmodder. I will admit that I have, occasionally, gone a little overboard in RP fights. The last RP board I actively participated in (for five good years) had a really strong Freestyle PvP culture, and most of the RPers there tended to have one or two main characters that they would use. As such these fights and tournaments became "canon" of sorts for our already well-adventured RP characters. And so, naturally, I allowed Bluehawk's powers to develop some.

The thing is, eventually I actually came to expect a [I]challenge from these fights. Every one of Hawk's abilities was dogged with SOME kind of weakness (and not something stupid like "ONLY A LIGHTSABAR CAN DE-FEET HIM LOLZ", I mean strategic weaknesses that just about anyone can exploit IF they're clever) and every move I made ensured that Hawk's abilities were used to their maximum efficiency. But what happened? Because I contrasted with a bunch of people who do nothing but hurl a bunch of random attacks at their opponants and hope for the best (and I don't go for that, I try to actually CHALLENGE people and have FUN with a battle, not "oh guess i use this move next m i doin it rite?") I was suddenly branded a godmodder and mocked out by several of the mods when I attempted to explain my case, not to mention threatened with banination with I objected to said mocking.

Yeah, I'm still kinda sore 'bout that one. Once upon a time the only real way to offend via godmodding was by controlling someone else's character (including closed-ended attacks) or occasionally by having omni-powers such as shields that nobody can get through.

Interestingly enough I've just heard a very similar complaint from one of my friends - that a lot of people complain that their attacks are being evaded too much but they don't actually put in any effort to ensuring that they hit an agile foe or one who can defend against their attacks. A fight isn't just "lol attacks lol"! It's about constantly finding new and improved ways to implement one's abilities effectively against another's! Ugh.

...So yeah anyways, heads up. If you're ever in an RP fight with me, perhaps not so much with my Light-side avatar here as he's pretty inexperienced at the moment, but later on especially, I will expect a certain level of effort before I begin yielding any decent hits. :P

Which is the exact reason I completely gave up on roleplaying. I hate it when people start fights with me. I knew what I was talking about the whole time, and those stupid noobs who neglect the rules try to tell you otherwise. There isn't much you can do about that but laugh at their ignorance.

Bluehawk Dustorm

June 8th, 2007, 06:41 AM

[font=calibri]Which is the exact reason I completely gave up on roleplaying. I hate it when people start fights with me. I knew what I was talking about the whole time, and those stupid noobs who neglect the rules try to tell you otherwise. There isn't much you can do about that but laugh at their ignorance.

Well, the thing that hurt (and it did hurt) was the fact that I used to be quite highly regarded and respected as an RPer on that same board a couple of years back, and the fact that I'd basically called the place home (moreso than any actual residence, as that place had been "with" me through a lot more of the good and bad times than any house has :P I know it sounds really really sad when I try to explain it, but I promise I do in fact have an active social life :P) for a good four and a half years only to be quite abruptly backstabbed by the very people who were supposed to remain impartial and consider everyone's point of view.

Kind of ironic that the place I used to go to as an escape from life under a load of high-school bullying eventually became the place I started getting bullied at. And the change occurred right when my social life picked up too. XXD

...I've gone and ranted about my personal life yet again. Please just tell me to shut up when I do this, it happens a lot.

Chikara

June 8th, 2007, 06:49 AM

You rang? :P

One thing that kind of annoys me personally is the overzealous antigodmodder. I will admit that I have, occasionally, gone a little overboard in RP fights. The last RP board I actively participated in (for five good years) had a really strong Freestyle PvP culture, and most of the RPers there tended to have one or two main characters that they would use. As such these fights and tournaments became "canon" of sorts for our already well-adventured RP characters. And so, naturally, I allowed Bluehawk's powers to develop some.

The thing is, eventually I actually came to expect a [I]challenge from these fights. Every one of Hawk's abilities was dogged with SOME kind of weakness (and not something stupid like "ONLY A LIGHTSABAR CAN DE-FEET HIM LOLZ", I mean strategic weaknesses that just about anyone can exploit IF they're clever) and every move I made ensured that Hawk's abilities were used to their maximum efficiency. But what happened? Because I contrasted with a bunch of people who do nothing but hurl a bunch of random attacks at their opponants and hope for the best (and I don't go for that, I try to actually CHALLENGE people and have FUN with a battle, not "oh guess i use this move next m i doin it rite?") I was suddenly branded a godmodder and mocked out by several of the mods when I attempted to explain my case, not to mention threatened with banination with I objected to said mocking.

Yeah, I'm still kinda sore 'bout that one. Once upon a time the only real way to offend via godmodding was by controlling someone else's character (including closed-ended attacks) or occasionally by having omni-powers such as shields that nobody can get through.

Interestingly enough I've just heard a very similar complaint from one of my friends - that a lot of people complain that their attacks are being evaded too much but they don't actually put in any effort to ensuring that they hit an agile foe or one who can defend against their attacks. A fight isn't just "lol attacks lol"! It's about constantly finding new and improved ways to implement one's abilities effectively against another's! Ugh.

...So yeah anyways, heads up. If you're ever in an RP fight with me, perhaps not so much with my Light-side avatar here as he's pretty inexperienced at the moment, but later on especially, I will expect a certain level of effort before I begin yielding any decent hits. :P

Well, the thing that hurt (and it did hurt) was the fact that I used to be quite highly regarded and respected as an RPer on that same board a couple of years back, and the fact that I'd basically called the place home (moreso than any actual residence, as that place had been "with" me through a lot more of the good and bad times than any house has :P I know it sounds really really sad when I try to explain it, but I promise I do in fact have an active social life :P) for a good four and a half years only to be quite abruptly backstabbed by the very people who were supposed to remain impartial and consider everyone's point of view.

Kind of ironic that the place I used to go to as an escape from life under a load of high-school bullying eventually became the place I started getting bullied at. And the change occurred right when my social life picked up too. XXD

...I've gone and ranted about my personal life yet again. Please just tell me to shut up when I do this, it happens a lot.

Shut up XO *smacketh the Hawk*

Well that just stink. And the RPing here is basically dead.There's just no good place to Roleplay anymore *sigh* Well as I said, just laugh at the peoples ignorance. They're just online anyway, right? What can they do? Call you a noob? How hurtful ;;

The best thing you can do is just try to lay low for a while. Don't try to stand out or that might make people get onto you like they are now. I dont know though, I barely understand the situation here, so I'm giving the best advice I can muster to the moment ^^'

Scales

June 8th, 2007, 02:04 PM

Shut up XO *smacketh the Hawk*

Well that just stink. And the RPing here is basically dead.There's just no good place to Roleplay anymore *sigh* Well as I said, just laugh at the peoples ignorance. They're just online anyway, right? What can they do? Call you a noob? How hurtful ;;

The best thing you can do is just try to lay low for a while. Don't try to stand out or that might make people get onto you like they are now. I dont know though, I barely understand the situation here, so I'm giving the best advice I can muster to the moment ^^'

Mainly the reason RPING dies is because people become bored with it and stop posting. The only way to keep a roleplay alive just like a fire is to stay in contact with it and continue to use it.

But if you are desperate to roleplay just create one. Its not that hard. The simplest ideas are usually the best ones

But this is partially the roleplayers fault. Because they accept someone who is likely to leave a roleplay it is partially their fault. People have to accept people not just on their signup sheets. But on how trust worthy they are in posting in a roleplay.

Plus in order to keep a roleplay going you need to keep it interesting. So come up with the most original piece to add to the roleplay. Like art a roleplay must make sense and functions well with the story

Thats my advice for roleplaying

Well, the thing that hurt (and it did hurt) was the fact that I used to be quite highly regarded and respected as an RPer on that same board a couple of years back, and the fact that I'd basically called the place home (moreso than any actual residence, as that place had been "with" me through a lot more of the good and bad times than any house has I know it sounds really really sad when I try to explain it, but I promise I do in fact have an active social life ) for a good four and a half years only to be quite abruptly backstabbed by the very people who were supposed to remain impartial and consider everyone's point of view.

Kind of ironic that the place I used to go to as an escape from life under a load of high-school bullying eventually became the place I started getting bullied at. And the change occurred right when my social life picked up too. XXD

...I've gone and ranted about my personal life yet again. Please just tell me to shut up when I do this, it happens a lot.

Well anyway if you want to roleplay this is a pretty good place. There are experience roleplayers here. But mainly I see nosebleed roleplayers just leave the second people need them the most

Anyway my advice to you is dont give up on this board. I may start a Starwars roleplay in the near future

Bluehawk Dustorm

June 8th, 2007, 09:05 PM

Well, what looks like being part of the problem here is that people seem to create new characters for every new RP thread they join. As such you can't spend too much time thinking about the preliminaries of the character and you don't get a whole lot of time to develop them either. Obviously this isn't going to change overnight but (in my experience) it works better when there's a whole bunch of different, often shorter RPs that affect the respective canons of every character involved, and then diverse inter-character relationships and issues are more likely to form, which then affect the way a character acts and thinks for years to come, giving rise to more depth.

Alter Ego

June 8th, 2007, 11:40 PM

You rang? :P

Why yes I did, good sir. Welcome to the not-yet-fully-deceased RP section. :3

One thing that kind of annoys me personally is the overzealous antigodmodder. I will admit that I have, occasionally, gone a little overboard in RP fights. The last RP board I actively participated in (for five good years) had a really strong Freestyle PvP culture, and most of the RPers there tended to have one or two main characters that they would use. As such these fights and tournaments became "canon" of sorts for our already well-adventured RP characters. And so, naturally, I allowed Bluehawk's powers to develop some.

The thing is, eventually I actually came to expect a [i]challenge from these fights. Every one of Hawk's abilities was dogged with SOME kind of weakness (and not something stupid like "ONLY A LIGHTSABAR CAN DE-FEET HIM LOLZ", I mean strategic weaknesses that just about anyone can exploit IF they're clever) and every move I made ensured that Hawk's abilities were used to their maximum efficiency. But what happened? Because I contrasted with a bunch of people who do nothing but hurl a bunch of random attacks at their opponants and hope for the best (and I don't go for that, I try to actually CHALLENGE people and have FUN with a battle, not "oh guess i use this move next m i doin it rite?") I was suddenly branded a godmodder and mocked out by several of the mods when I attempted to explain my case, not to mention threatened with banination with I objected to said mocking.

Now that seriously sucks. Mods shouldn't go about flaming people, no matter what the reason. T_T As long as you weren't having your character mysteriously manifesting precisely the kind of skills he needed in the middle of a battle or having all your attacks make contact without giving the opponent a chance at countering then it wasn't godmodding. I do agree that people should try to do it logically, not 'He threw the deadly shoe of doom at his opponent and killed him instantly'. <.<

Yeah, I'm still kinda sore 'bout that one. Once upon a time the only real way to offend via godmodding was by controlling someone else's character (including closed-ended attacks) or occasionally by having omni-powers such as shields that nobody can get through.

Interestingly enough I've just heard a very similar complaint from one of my friends - that a lot of people complain that their attacks are being evaded too much but they don't actually put in any effort to ensuring that they hit an agile foe or one who can defend against their attacks. A fight isn't just "lol attacks lol"! It's about constantly finding new and improved ways to implement one's abilities effectively against another's! Ugh.

...So yeah anyways, heads up. If you're ever in an RP fight with me, perhaps not so much with my Light-side avatar here as he's pretty inexperienced at the moment, but later on especially, I will expect a certain level of effort before I begin yielding any decent hits. :P

Okay, I agree with what you're saying, but...keep in mind that all of the RPs here aren't combat-centric, meaning that people might not appreciate battles between two people going on page after page like strategic PvPs tend to do. So yeah, hope you like something about RPing besides the violent bits. ;D

Shut up XO *smacketh the Hawk*

Well that just stink. And the RPing here is basically dead.There's just no good place to Roleplay anymore *sigh* Well as I said, just laugh at the peoples ignorance. They're just online anyway, right? What can they do? Call you a noob? How hurtful ;;

The best thing you can do is just try to lay low for a while. Don't try to stand out or that might make people get onto you like they are now. I dont know though, I barely understand the situation here, so I'm giving the best advice I can muster to the moment ^^'

I'd love to scream 'noooo!' at that statement about RPing here, but it's all too true. I mean, almost all of the good RPers are gone at the moment and posting activity has been very bad. Mika-chan promised that she'd get some posts done, but I'm still waiting for those, so I dunno', Charon won't be back until some time after the 15th, Jyukai is still on vacation and the rest of them are MIA. T_T

So yeah, the situation here is that most of us are basically forced into waiting for the absentees because we're the only currently active RPers in our respective RPs. I'd start a new one myself, but with the current amount of people here being what it is...urgh, I don't know if it's worth it since there might not even be enough people willing to join. >_<

Well, what looks like being part of the problem here is that people seem to create new characters for every new RP thread they join. As such you can't spend too much time thinking about the preliminaries of the character and you don't get a whole lot of time to develop them either. Obviously this isn't going to change overnight but (in my experience) it works better when there's a whole bunch of different, often shorter RPs that affect the respective canons of every character involved, and then diverse inter-character relationships and issues are more likely to form, which then affect the way a character acts and thinks for years to come, giving rise to more depth.

How ironic, I seem to find the direct opposite to be a problem; people are posting the same sing-up sheets everywhere, with no consideration as to whether the character will fit the plot or not. I mean, I've seen some go around copy-pasting the same, hastily scribbled, sign-up sheet into every new RP around. I get what you're saying about characters with history, but I for one can't really bring myself to take a character from the middle of an ongoing RP (the conflicts of which have yet to be resolved) and put him in another. I mean, he still isn't done developing in the first, dangit! >_< Mika-chan and Charon have some characters with RPing history, though, so I've seen what you mean, but myself? I haven't gotten there yet, unfortunately. .__.

parallelzero

June 9th, 2007, 09:26 AM

I'd love to scream 'noooo!' at that statement about RPing here, but it's all too true. I mean, almost all of the good RPers are gone at the moment and posting activity has been very bad. Mika-chan promised that she'd get some posts done, but I'm still waiting for those, so I dunno', Charon won't be back until some time after the 15th, Jyukai is still on vacation and the rest of them are MIA. T_T

What? I don't get honourable mention? XD. Kidding, kidding, I'm not that splendid anyways. Well, it always gets dead around this time of the year due to summer starting and exams, along with other various tasks. I'm personally swamped with homework because exams are next week for me, and I'm sure there are others under similar circumstances. I'm going off to Europe for 2 weeks at the beginning of July, and I'm hoping the trip will help me to think up something new and original, since all of the RPs lately have felt to be the same. (Not to mention I'm getting sick of all the RPs on the same topic. Naruto, for example)

Animehero

July 16th, 2007, 08:18 AM

Well, as with all things online, the quality of role-play tends to come and go. And yes, there is a reason I posted this here instead of in the RP Lounge, namely that the Lounge tends to be overlooked. However, if either of the mods feel this is not a good reason, feel free to move it. I just used my best judgement as to what would attract the most attention. Anyways, back to what this is all about: a list of bad habits that all RPrs, old and new (myself included) should attempt to avoid. This is not meant against anyone in particular, just a few things that I would like to see people make an effort to correct.

The Slapdash Character: Try to spend a decent length of time writing a new character. I try to take at LEAST 15 minutes, 20-30 for ones I intend to reuse. Believe me, a hastily-thrown together character shows, and they aren't much fun to RP as or with. If you're reusing a character, modifying them to the RP is an obvious move, but also try to correct the things you found made them less fun to play as in previous RPs.

The Cliche Character: Yes, we've all been there, particularly when we start RPing. But theses are characters such as the Cynical Mercenary, the Angsty But Still Good Demon, the Warrior With A Tragic Past, etc. etc. Yes, these can be fun characters to play at times, but they're incredibly common and it's nice to see an RPr take the effort to come up with something out of the ordinary. I'm guilty of creating and using such characters myself, but I try to avoid it.

The One-Liner: I disagree with the decision to enforce a four-line/one-paragraph rule in the RP forums because circumstances do arise where such a rule is, quite simply, inane and actually DETRACTS from post quality (this is especially true in drawn-out conversations), but it's nice to see people make the effort to add as much detail as possible.

The No-setting Plot: You can have gobs of plot in an RP, I mean, and immensely detailed, drawn-out affair, but what about the setting? What season is it? Is it mountainous? Humid? Does it snow almost year-round? Is it far to the north, or equatorial? All these things effect the setting of the plot. Like, if it's far to the north or south, the seasons won't be as diverse, and the days and nights, much longer, depending on the season. The Araura Borealis (or Astraulias) will show up too. Is it a rich county or a poor one? Densely populated? All of this is important.

The Not-applicable-to-element Character (applies to elemental RPs only): I know I spoke against cliched characters earlier, but if your character has control of a specific element, they're HIGHLY likely (read: certainly) to reflect traits of it in their personalities. So a water-element mage isn't going to be hasty or reckless, as those are traits given to the fire-element. Similarly, a light-element character isn't going to be a hyper-depressive cutter.

The Optional Personality: This is a personal pet peeve of mine. I HATE seeing the Personality in an RP sign-up made an option. It should, in my opinion, be a required field, along with Appearance, Name, Gender, Race and Age. There's a good reason for all this, there's a good reason for a Personality field, namely that it give you a way to force your character to act. Real people don't simply skip around from emotion to emotion, they typically have a set group of reactions and emotions. So should your character. Even better is a history that agrees with this, e.g., a happy-go-lucky, carefree character isn't going to see their parents brutally murdered in front of them when they were six.

The Punctuation And Capitilization: Put them in, and put them in right. Proper nouns, new sentences, acronyms, and "I," all get a capital. Spaces after commas, periods, question marks, semicols, etc. etc. Study the rules of punctuation and commit them to memory.

The Post That Obviously Didn't Get Read Over: I'll admit that I've done this too, when a lot of people are RPing and I'm trying to keep up, or when dinner's almost on and I'm rushed, but in general, read over each post for typos. Because typos are annoying.
Alright, that's what I personally would like to see improved upon. Just a helpful (hopefully) little list.
I caused major confusion because of the fact I didn't look at this.

Flygon trainer

January 26th, 2008, 07:41 PM

I haven't seen any official rule on it or anything, but I've been browsing the RP threads for a little bit, and maybe I haven't browsed enough, but I have the following questions:

1. Is there a preference on the forum between playing as a Pokemon or a human?

2. If there is no preference, are modified pokemon allowed?

3. On a similar strand as earlier, what about Pokemorphs or pokemon/human mixes?

Alter Ego

January 27th, 2008, 12:30 AM

Um...I'm not really sure how this fits in with the topic here, but since there isn't really a more suitable one I suppose I'll try answering this. =O

1. Is there a preference on the forum between playing as a Pokemon or a human?

Well, in most cases you end up playing both since the humans tend to have pokémon (both of which you control). As far as the 'main' characters are concerned...it seems to be mostly trainers in the spotlight, moreso now than before unless my memory is deceiving me. But yeah, I guess it's just easier to handle things from a human perspective. Speaking of personal experience, far too many of the RPs without human protagonists have been disappointments because the 'pokémon' have acted and reasoned just like humans, which sort of defeats the purpose of having a pokémon character in the first place. :\

So yeah, I'd say that people generally tend to lean towards human characters.

2. If there is no preference, are modified pokemon allowed?

Umm...just what do you mean by 'modified' pokémon? If you mean like pokéfusions (homg I've got Venucharistoise, all bow! >O), fakemon or pokémon that have just been granted extra abilities for no apparent reason then I'd say that we - thankfully - don't get a lot of those. That 'thankfully' could just be my personal bias speaking, though, because I dislike concepts that leave so much room for blatant powerplay. (pokémon miraculously manifesting a new ability or move just when they need it comes to mind <.<) But no, there's no rule against 'modified' pokémon, as you say, but the people you RP with have to condone it.

3. On a similar strand as earlier, what about Pokemorphs or pokemon/human mixes?

Ahh...Pokémorphs, those were all the rage back when I was still a n00b here. x3 Haven't seen any Pokémorph RPs for a while (at least not anything with enough quality to bear mentioning), but yes, they are allowed (though, again, only at the discretion of the RP master). I suppose they've just sort of fallen out of style, though I do have a few ideas for those sketched out in my mind. It will take a good five months before I get to implement any of them, but that's a completely different story that I won't get into.

So yeah, they're not the hip and happening thing right now, but pokémorph RPs are A-OK. :3

Flygon trainer

January 27th, 2008, 11:21 AM

Well, in most cases you end up playing both since the humans tend to have pokémon (both of which you control). As far as the 'main' characters are concerned...it seems to be mostly trainers in the spotlight, moreso now than before unless my memory is deceiving me. But yeah, I guess it's just easier to handle things from a human perspective. Speaking of personal experience, far too many of the RPs without human protagonists have been disappointments because the 'pokémon' have acted and reasoned just like humans, which sort of defeats the purpose of having a pokémon character in the first place. :\

.... They don't? The Pokemon from Mystery Dungeon and multiple pokemon from the anime seem to act and reason much like humans. Perhaps I'm mistaken?

Alter Ego

January 27th, 2008, 11:47 AM

.... They don't? The Pokemon from Mystery Dungeon and multiple pokemon from the anime seem to act and reason much like humans. Perhaps I'm mistaken?

That...is a matter of interpretation. Personally, I'm opposed to that notion. Pokémon being as intelligent as (or even more intelligent than) humans I have no issues with, but equal intelligence doesn't mean thinking in the same way. I suppose that a domesticated pokémon that has spent the better part of its life in human society (and thus would have picked up some habits on the way) could be justified in using concepts related to human society, but even in those cases I like to keep the original instincts in place, like having a Victreebel instinctively attempting to devour any suitable creature that comes into reach or having a Tailow think of bug types as food rather than intelligent beings etc. Intelligent or no, pokémon are still animals of a sort and should act as such. This is probably what bugged me most about MD too; I mean, a bunch of random pokémon species inhabiting structures built with human architecture and not at all suited for them? Wtf? o.O

So yeah, I'd love to argue longer on this, but I've got a bus to catch so that will have to wait. Suffice to say that I'm opposed to the anime/MD interpretation of pokémon behavior. :3

Loki

January 27th, 2008, 12:08 PM

Hmm, and this really doesn't belong in this thread. D:

I'll leave these posts intact but in the future Flygon Trainer, try to limit your questions to PM, since they're irrelevant to the topic presented in this thread.

Ninetales

February 11th, 2008, 10:33 PM

Hmm things that irritate me about roleplayer? That is indeed an interest question. I strongly dislike first person point of view in rps, mainly because in rps there are usually more then one person and it can get confusing. I also agree with Alter-Kun on the picture thing. I can not STAND it when people just rip off of another anime or something for a character unless they are rping that particular character. It shows lack of creativity and those people should not rp unless they are willing to make their own characters. (Not counting rps that are of actual Manga/Anime/ect.) This thread amuses me greatly I must say...

Yes, I hate that too. I see a lot of people put random anime pictures for appearances, especially. I mean, pictures are a wonderful thing in RPG's--they're worth a thousand words, after all. They especially help when you're creating a non-human character, like a Pokemon or Digimon. (I have the common habit of making Digimon out of Pokemon I created, developed, and have pictures for...)

*looks at her own sig* No, none of the characters listed there are anime ripoffs. I repeat that.

I got SO angry at this. I'm European. There are many subtle spelling differences between US spelling and UK spelling. This has only happened once or twice, but one time I was signing up for a so-called 'advance' roleplay, and over and over again, I was told off for spelling colour 'wrong', and told I wasn't a good roleplayer for this. ¬¬;

That must be harsh... And to think, I chose to spell everything that way...

Okay, first official peeve is the standardised characters in RP's being used and reused over and over again. I'm not pointing the finger at anyone, but I've joined about three to four RP's in the last fortnight or so and some of the other members who have also joined in the same RP, use exactly the same character. And the thing is, they're continuing to use the same character over and over again, without making any improvements or changes to their profile. The only solution I can come up with if I'm ever in an RP with a profile I've seen three or more times before, is that I'll just withdraw from the RP or decline them immediately.

Actually, recycled profiles can be good if they're a good enough signup overall. Wait a minute, I'm speaking for myself again... I admittedly recycle profiles very frequently--when I sign up for an RPG, about 75% of the time, I take out a character from my "character bank" and put him/her into the RPG. However, whenever I do this, I make any necessary changes to their history, especially, to fit the RPG. Sometimes I might just copy over things like Appearance and Personality, but those two fields hardly ever have to adapt to a specific RPG anyway--they're just part of a character. And occasionally, when signing up, I find something new to add to the character and throw that in. Also, one thing I very commonly do in a Pokemon RPG is experiment with giving my characters different Pokemon, yet keep some of their favourites--for example.
*So this is not lack of creativity--it's character development. Because RPG's die and whatever. Or at least, 95% of RPGs I've been in never got very far. Maybe I'm just unlucky...

Another 15% of the time in a signup, I RP a character I haven't RP'd in a long time, so I completely re-do the profile, while looking at the old signup as a sort of template. The other 10% percent of the time, I create a completely new character for an RPG.

But sometimes, characters change as I change, sometimes slowly, sometimes very quickly. One interesting RP experience I'd like to share is: Back in October of 2006, I signed up for an RPG, signing up as a character I newly created. This RPG went on for over a year and a half (and is still active now), and since then, that character has drastically changed in appearance, history, maybe even personality a bit... Plus, the RPG has been revived twice, and in the most recent version, I even modified my signup slightly so that it wasn't completely outdated, yet still was close to my original signup in order to keep my character consistent... So yeah... currently I'm RP'ing the outdated Lupin in one RPG, the up-to-date Lupin in another, and as an NPC in a third (with his son as my main character).

Brad

February 15th, 2008, 04:10 AM

The worst is me. My profiles are overpowered...

Phanima

February 15th, 2008, 05:47 AM

Actually, recycled profiles can be good if they're a good enough signup overall. Wait a minute, I'm speaking for myself again... I admittedly recycle profiles very frequently--when I sign up for an RPG, about 75% of the time, I take out a character from my "character bank" and put him/her into the RPG. However, whenever I do this, I make any necessary changes to their history, especially, to fit the RPG. Sometimes I might just copy over things like Appearance and Personality, but those two fields hardly ever have to adapt to a specific RPG anyway--they're just part of a character. And occasionally, when signing up, I find something new to add to the character and throw that in. Also, one thing I very commonly do in a Pokemon RPG is experiment with giving my characters different Pokemon, yet keep some of their favourites--for example.
*So this is not lack of creativity--it's character development. Because RPG's die and whatever. Or at least, 95% of RPGs I've been in never got very far. Maybe I'm just unlucky...

Another 15% of the time in a signup, I RP a character I haven't RP'd in a long time, so I completely re-do the profile, while looking at the old signup as a sort of template. The other 10% percent of the time, I create a completely new character for an RPG.

But sometimes, characters change as I change, sometimes slowly, sometimes very quickly. One interesting RP experience I'd like to share is: Back in October of 2006, I signed up for an RPG, signing up as a character I newly created. This RPG went on for over a year and a half (and is still active now), and since then, that character has drastically changed in appearance, history, maybe even personality a bit... Plus, the RPG has been revived twice, and in the most recent version, I even modified my signup slightly so that it wasn't completely outdated, yet still was close to my original signup in order to keep my character consistent... So yeah... currently I'm RP'ing the outdated Lupin in one RPG, the up-to-date Lupin in another, and as an NPC in a third (with his son as my main character).

Wow, I posted that ages ago, when I was still a newbie. XD

But anyway, you're talking about Space Shield Crisis right? I was actually looking forward to joining it when it got revived the first time, since Sunflorazumarill is scarily competent when it comes to detail and the plot was extremely engrossing, but in the end I got sidetracked and ended up lurking for a while, heh.

And that's a good point about the profiles, but at that time, I was getting a little irritated with the amount of characters I saw over and over again in every RP I joined, and even some of the ones I didn't. Plus, because I was taking my time to make up new and more plot sensitive characters for every RP I joined, it kind of irked me that some people were using the same character they signed up with in a Pokemon RP that also got accepted in a non-Pokemon RP.

Of course, I'm up for character development, where there is significant potential, but back in the day, it was the cookie cutter and recycled profiles that annoyed me the most. I used to do the same thing when I first started, believe it or not (try not to though XD), but I kind of moved out of doing that, since there were a lot of RP's I wanted to join and using the same character would've bored me to hell. So I started branching out a little, you know, like; swaping genders, making personalities that I wasn't familiar with and the like. Well, I'm still trying that now, cause if there's something I don't like, it's generic and cliche characters. *shudder

But again, experimentation and development are all good, it's just a matter of stepping out of your comfort zone...that or people need to stop being lazy. XP *is guilty

The worst is me. My profiles are overpowered...

I have to admit Brad, your profiles have caught my attention...but not for the best of reasons. DX

I'm joking of course! But yeah, sometimes it's hard to tone down our characters when we're exposed to series that are often cliche and highly popular. I know that when I read mangas like Bleach and Naruto, it's hard not to make a character that is as strong as an eye-patch-less Kenpachi or a five open gates Rock Lee, since they undoubtedly make things interesting, BUT, I also found out that minor character roles can also be fun and unique in their own sense. It might just be personal opinion, but I like taking on personalities that are completely different from myself or what I'm used to, cause it's new and exciting and unexpected. Of course, I guess that's normal for a lot of roleplaying forums. I mean, we come here to become characters we wish we could be or just to get away from our real selves right? Right?!

But I digress, experiment! I'm in no position to lecture people since I'm ever learning myself, but I think it's a good suggestion. Now obey me and be different! >D

I've gotten used to it though, with the majority of RP's dying due to inactivity, I mean, the last time I saw an RP actually finish was almost a year ago. That was something special...

But anyway, I'm not really complaining, since it's not that big of a deal (so far...) but just for those who are reading and are currently roleplaying: keep it up people!

Idiot!

February 15th, 2008, 08:07 AM

I've seen my writing sample being stolen before. It was completely copied word for word, even a small typo mistake was left as it is. Guess what? The writing sample was reposted in the same RP thread by some moron desparate to get accepted but couldn't write a good sample. Won't anyone notice the same sample was used by two different people, and was obviously stolen?

foxfiredemon

April 27th, 2008, 03:06 PM

That all depends. If the storyteller doesn't really READ the Post just sees it as Long, and seemingly well worded. They'll just accept it. Not all of them do this but you see it happen with RPs with no real plot and the person who started not having a grip on the English Language. I probably used Cliches, I've only ever made one original character and the name and basic Arch type was seemingly stolen by the makers of Devil May Care. But no matter. I still try to keep my posts fresh without stepping into the world of Godmoding/Making myself seem like I can do anything. I do sometimes do it without thinking and sometimes don't even realize it until a day later and by then the plot has advanced and such and it's too late. I also try to make a post long enough to make it interesting but I don't like acting for other people which would help me advance my post abit.

The Mega Champion

June 17th, 2008, 01:51 PM

You want to know what I hate? RP's that end abruptly. Also known as RP's that end before the story ends.

I have a few things to add; though I'm not sure anything could be added that wasn’t already..

@Champion (the post above me): I guess that really has to do with the Thread Creator/Role-play Master.. As mentioned a lot in this thread, an incompetent R.P Master really ruins the whole experience for me.

If the creator has this well thought out plan to make a thread (with a good plot, setting, etc. etc.), posts it in the RP forums, then decides last minute to abandon it leaving no further trace of them ever again.. Isn’t that frustrating to anyone else?
It's all well and good if they say that they're no longer interested and plan to leave, but why let the people who signed up (hoping for a good role-play, and just might have spent time and effort on their character profiles) sit there to rot for eternity?
Either:
1. Say you're going to leave, so at least everyone else know the thread's original creator is no longer there..

Or

2. Again, say you're going to leave, but pass the position of RP Master to someone else, so the thread can continue.

Another thing that would contribute to a short thread would probably be the role-players themselves - for reasons too obvious to state.
If the RP Master allows the less experienced RPers to join (please note I have nothing against newer Role-players, as long as they can type properly and have a general idea of what they're doing), who post one reply then leave due to their own impatience, then others will pick up on the vibe and probably leave to.
This has happened to me, and often spoils my mood in that thread - causing me to leave disappointed.

Or, the fact that there are bad Role-players in the thread scares off any of the truely competent/good (or whatever else) ones.
Just an opinion though, as most of this entire post is.

--

I also read a few pages back about how super-powerful Pokémon, cutesy Pokémon, or "eevee-lutions" (or however it was spelled.. Either way, you get my drift) being on a team is annoying.
To a point I agree, and again, to a point I don’t.

What I can say is that, yes, super-god-like-untouchable-somethingyoucanneverbeatinyourlife Pokémon are MUCH too annoying to express (in my mind, if you cant loose at least once or accept that at least someone is better than you - then something is indeed wrong.. Having ambition and such is fine and all, but there is a boundary), but I have no idea how the cutesy-type would have the same effect.
If the trainer happens to like that Pokémon and added it to their team solely for that reason, (if it brightens up their team, its just a side thing I suppose) I don’t see a problem with it. Personal taste comes into effect here, I suspect.

Now "eevee-lutions".. Well.. I cant actually badmouth them. Yes, they are very old in a sense that practically everyone has one on their team - but since I have a fetish for Vaporeon (meaning if I can obtain one in a game/role-play, I'll probably end up getting one) I'm unable to say anything beyond that.

Loki

June 26th, 2008, 05:25 PM

I've seen my writing sample being stolen before. It was completely copied word for word, even a small typo mistake was left as it is. Guess what? The writing sample was reposted in the same RP thread by some moron desparate to get accepted but couldn't write a good sample. Won't anyone notice the same sample was used by two different people, and was obviously stolen?

Well, if this ever happens in PC, I will forcibly beat that bad habit out of them.

Either that, or the infractions'll beat them out of PC entirely. :x That's plagiarizing, and it's worth four permanent red infraction points. (Which really hits home.)

The first post is really important. It sizes up what you're made of, whether you're going to make business in the thread or just flop like a dried up Magikarp. And you're going to dried- and fried, if you make the entire thread wait for your first post. Timely posting habits are good. People don't like to wait for you as much as you don't like to wait for them. And making everyone wait for unreasonably long periods of time, or making the RP master come after you to harp for posts, certainly do not raise your bar. If you can't post in a roleplay on a regular basis, (Unless the RP isn't moving at a regular basis speed) then don't join. Get out, get out, and don't come back until you have the time. <_< And if you promise someone that you'll post at a certain time POST BY THAT TIME for sweet mother of jesus sakes. x_O;; (though I'm being hypocritical about this)

So many people just sign-up and are like "Oh, I totally forgot I signed-up for that RP, LOL!" <-- Yeah well, you know what the rest of the thread is thinking? "GTFO."

The Mega Champion

June 27th, 2008, 12:45 PM

*comes back*

I agree Sayaira. In fact, I've checked the RP Master's information of the RP I was in. He hasn't been active on PC since, IIRC, the 21st of March. I suppose there could be other factors involved, but, yes, he should of said he was leaving and/or said it and passed on control of the RP to someone else. Yet, he doesn't come on, and is just to lazy to cancel the RP or pass control of it on to someone else, and seemingly acts like the RP never existed.

Of course, once again, there could be other factors involved here, but, that's just the way it seems to me right now. Which is why I took back the rights of the RP character I was using so I could use it in another RP that won't die. ^_^' If one exists.........

Sayaira

June 27th, 2008, 01:20 PM

@Champion:
I was thinking of making a role-play myself soon.. (since I have over 15 posts now, and can posts images/urls) So if you're interested in a Pokémon related one, send me a PM.

Its really like what Loki said.. The RP Master has (or someone else joins with) a short lasting enthusiasm, has a whole bunch of people sign up, then he either gets bored with the idea, or, decides he's over his head and abandons the whole thing to rot (or get taken over by a more competant RP Master, which is what most hope for when the other leaves with his tail between his legs).

If the guy still does come on, and just pretends that RP didn’t exist, then someone PM's him about it; things can go either way:
1. He doesnt respond.

2. He responds but says: "I totally forgot I made that RP. LOL!" <- Gtfo.
or, "I've been way to busy to manage that board and didn’t have time to tell anyone!" <- Bullfeet. Why are you responding to this then?

3. He picks a fight, saying he did remember the RP, the site just didn’t work on his computer, or it wouldn’t let him post.. etc. etc. and whatever, whatever. We all know its Bullfeet.

Alter Ego

June 27th, 2008, 02:43 PM

Yay! People are posting here again! :3

2. He responds but says: "I totally forgot I made that RP. LOL!" <- Gtfo.
or, "I've been way to busy to manage that board and didn’t have time to tell anyone!" <- Bullfeet. Why are you responding to this then?

3. He picks a fight, saying he did remember the RP, the site just didn’t work on his computer, or it wouldn’t let him post.. etc. etc. and whatever, whatever. We all know its Bullfeet.
[/FONT]

Erm...not to rain on your parade or anything, but I'd like to point out that there's a slight difference between having the time to occasionally reply to a PM and having the time to run an RP and keep posts of proper quality coming. In my experience, the former tends to consume far less time than the latter. (Hence why I, with a heavy heart, shut down Neo Genesis when my draftee period started; I thought it was preferable to leaving everyone with the dreaded 'now what?' scenario) Just up and disappearing without even dropping a simple one-line excuse, however, is a completely different matter and one of the rudest things you can do to your RPers. The least you owe them is an OOC of apology/explanation. :<

Also, sometimes the site really doesn't work/let people through. Again, personal story: I poofed from here for almost two months once because I was too much of a ditz to realize that one of the site urls (the 'theud' one, as I recall) was up and running but the other was still down after the last server crash. But yes, nine out of ten times the 'I couldn't post' thing is just BSing.

And like, I'd give my full views on the RPing commitment thing, but seeing as how I've been harping about it for...what? Two and a half years now? I think I'll spare you guys the full rant this time around. XD Suffice to say that I'm behind Loki's stance on this 110%. Commitment, peoples! Commitment! >O

Sayaira

June 27th, 2008, 03:12 PM

@Alter Ego: Meh, I was just ranting/venting. (Rain all you want? o_o) I haven’t had a chance to in a while.
(By the way, wasn’t Neo Genesis a site? As the name sounds familiar)

I joined a REALLY good role-play (no, really. Its plot was far better then most) with some friends about a month back, expecting something good (as people usually do?). A few days past and we all thought the creator of the thread was just busy or adding to the thread, etc. etc. A week past, and I sent him a private message asking if the role-play was even going ahead.
No reply. (big surprise there D: )

I sent him another message a few days ago asking the same thing - and yet again;
No reply.

Anyway about my previous post, I was just lumping the two together as excuses, but you're right. There is a difference between them.
I don’t know how many times I've been in a good role-play, and either the leader quits or most of the members do. If they do respond to my message/messages (I usually send one after about a week of not responding to the RP, if I actually like its plot and such), its usually either:
"I forgot about that, whoops!"
or
"My computer wouldn’t let me post!"

Its really annoying, especially for an up-and-coming RPer/writer/etc. like me, who really gets into the storyline after a few posts - and its happened far too many times for me to be comfortable with. And, as Loki or someone else has probably pointed out, if you don’t have time to Role-play in the first place, please don’t bother signing up. D:

Quote: "Commitment, peoples! Commitment!"

The Mega Champion

June 28th, 2008, 08:18 AM

lol. Yeah. I usually truly try to get into all the RP's I've participated in. As long as they have a good story, then I can usually look forward to the RP and really get into them. Unfortunately, most of the RP's I've been in have either died or have canceled. But, those RP's the RP Master actually said something. It's like a jinx or something. :(.

Brad

August 2nd, 2008, 08:05 PM

I have one- the words Adventure, Journey and Quest. If I see one more uncreatively named RPG from new people in this subforum I may have to puke.

Phoenix_Mew

August 2nd, 2008, 08:17 PM

Sometimes, those words are the only ones able to describe what's going on in the roleplay. And while they're a decent standby roleplay, I do prefer to join something a little more innovative.

(Hopefully one such brainchild of mine will be up here soon... if a mod approves it...)

Brad

August 3rd, 2008, 01:48 PM

I'm just miffed that our RPG forums were suddenly flooded with new RPGs. PMD RPG's are huge, etc- and I want the better stuff back- PLF, stuff by the mods and other veterans... I'm not saying all newb RPG's are bad, but most are not in the same league as the others. Not that mine are ever any good- I have no confidence in my skills...

The Mega Champion

August 4th, 2008, 01:17 PM

^^^Neither do I. I've never even tried to make an RP and probably never will. I'm only good with fanfiction plots. RP plots? Not so much. I just don't think I have the skills to make and moderate an RP. Which is why I always just join one, not make one.

Alter Ego

August 5th, 2008, 07:38 AM

Personally, I think the biggest problem I've seen around here lately, aside from the usual attendance hassle and people-not-reading-the-damn-rules, would be...

Houlier-than-thou attitudes.

Seriously, I've seen people with sign-ups that look weak at best picking on others, whose profiles were unfailingly either equal or better in quality. Similarly, newbs taking it upon them - by some obscure logic which I do not comprehend - to mini-mod other people's RPs, passing judgment like they were some kind of RPing messiahs or at the very least the proud owners of their very own death notes, and - most amusingly - people posting two-liner posts to complain about other peoples' three-line posts and pure OOCs to complain about the OOC spammage. *Rolls eyes* Seriously, guys; common sense and manners. This is supposed to be for fun. :|

As for the quality gap issue...it seems to be a matter of attitudes, sadly. Most of the RPing veterans are already stretched pretty thin in managing to get their foruming needs done and as such they primarily join RPs hosted by - you guessed it - other veterans because those are the only ones for which they have some kind of guarantee of quality. This, in turn, leads to the spots in said RPs getting filled up by a more or less regular cast of veterans, as their profiles tend to be drastically better than those of newbs. Thus, newbs are either too intimidated or unwilling to put in the effort to join a veteran RP and stick to the ones where you basically get approved for managing to write something - anything - into each one of those little fields in even semi-legible English, in other words: RPs which few veterans would deign to touch even with a ten-foot barge pole, at least for any other purpose than to laugh at and/or be frightened by them. Veterans RP with veterans, and newbs RP with newbs. Newbs don't get to learn from veterans and aren't pushed to writing as well as they really could because the newb RP masters are either completely unconcerned by any measure of writing standard or too scared of alienating RPers to ever enforce it while veterans are stuck playing in their own, slowly shrinking circles because there just aren't that many competent writers to go around. Consequently, we have a huge divide between newbs and veterans that can only really be crossed by those with unusual writing talent, prior writing experience, the right connections or the persistence and will to actually improve on their own. The discussion thread is deceased for all practical purposes and I have yet to find a single RP guide that actually covers IC posting or plot writing to any significant depth, so claiming that there is any real way to self-study your way to being a good RPer with those is questionable to say the least.

At least...that's my take on it. *Shrug*

Brad

August 8th, 2008, 06:06 PM

Yeah, I know. I was actaully planning to make of mock RPG, where you sign up as a really bad stereotype. I was going to be one of them- the evil satanic supermuscular antisocial dude with a dark past.

As usual, you are right... I sort of suck. I can write English, but my creativity is that of a donkey, and my ideas are so crazy that I get yelled at. Kansas knows all about it. Sorry Kansas... really sorry. Autism really does suck for me sometimes.

I've also seen the veteran Rpgs, save YZ, which is like if gods RP'ed, dry up eventually. As a lurker, I've seen a lot of good RP's just die off. The gap really dries up the amount of RP'ers, and some people dissapear. There are also the mediocre people- not illiterate enough to be newbs, but not good enough to get into most veteran RP's. Like me. I am that.

I am also seeing the same thing happening at other once RP-rich sites. Yes, SPPF. A lot of people joined, and the same thing is happening there. Of course, I abandoned SPPF for Poke, which I must say is better (for a mediocre class like me).

It's all a sad cycle. A really sad cycle. I used to spend my days RPing and thinking of ideas to post- now bygone for Civilization IV, an equally addicting, but less creative, activity. Its a shame, really...

Loki

August 8th, 2008, 06:46 PM

I've also seen the veteran Rpgs, save YZ, which is like if gods RP'ed, dry up eventually. As a lurker, I've seen a lot of good RP's just die off. The gap really dries up the amount of RP'ers, and some people dissapear. There are also the mediocre people- not illiterate enough to be newbs, but not good enough to get into most veteran RP's. Like me. I am that.

Well the attitude I had when going into YZ was... freakishly positive, to say the least. I still remember telling David, "I'm going to make this roleplay a success, no matter what it takes!" So even now, my face is still glued to the screen waiting like a rabid fangirl for the next chapter of BLEACH, making sure that there's nothing more than a 12 hour interval between the time someone posts and the time I end up reading the post. shut up, it's fun. So I think the attitude you have when you go into the RP really affects your interest in it. And the fact that David led us along like mules in the beginning really helped. xD!

But the attitude I had when signing up for like, The World Ends With You: Another Game was more like, "Oh, it's probably going to get past the first posts and be done with. Well whatever, might as well sign-up and see if it gets any further than what I'm expecting." And what do you know, it hasn't even started. <_<

Like I said, the attitude someone takes going into a roleplay will really impact how it's performance goes. If everyone's expecting it to die off, then it's going to die off, but if a collective group is determined enough to make the show go on, well. The show must go on. ;D

And I agree wholeheartedly with the name thing. I'm this close to banning 'Journey' and 'Adventure' from thread titles. xDDDD Kidding, kidding, for all those of you who think I'm a mindless tyrant.

Anyway, Alter Ego has a valid point. (As usual. :|)

RPs which few veterans would deign to touch even with a ten-foot barge pole, at least for any other purpose than to laugh at and/or be frightened by them.

^ My sentiments put into the best form possible. [/laugh]

And on other notes, out of all the 'new people' I've RP'd with, the only one that ever got anywhere was Kansas. :| He was patient with it, put up with veterans and their selective, "Ugh-ness" towards newbies, and slowly he got good enough so that when he signed up for the 'veteran' roleplays, you didn't hear a collective groan from everyone who has 'automatically accepted' printed across their forehead. Every other newbie I've been acquainted with either lost interest, seemed to have something else going on in their lives that should've been a red flag for them to not join an RP that would cause them to hinder the progress of the RP, or it was just as if their brains fell out of their heads after they finished writing their sign-up.

<_<

I mean, I used to really admire Kansas for being so generous. He'd always be on the lookout for freshmeat- I mean, fresh material. I think that's something we should all do, but it was like nobody really appreciated it. The newbies he'd set his eyes on would always fail in some way or another. They wouldn't post on time, they did something totally unprecedented, I dunno, something always didn't work right. I mean, who wants to put effort in and get nothing in return?

I think that the Pokemon Roleplay section is a great place to nurture new RP'ers. After all, this place is my home; my n00b self's heart and soul. I think what we really need is people who are willing to read everything. I mean, I learned so much just from reading ShadowFaith's sign-up sheets. I'm sure people would be able to pick up little things that they can add to their posts and sign-ups if they just read other people's stuff.

Oh, and I especially hate it when people are like, "I don't know what more to add. DDD:" To me, that's just a translation for: "I don't want to add anything else." or "I'm too lazy, sue me." There's plenty to add! I think having a list of things you could add would probably help a lot...? Like, "Accessories" "Hair" "Bangs?" "Clothes" "Eyes" "Eye shape?" "Body shape" "Tall?" "Short?" "Feet size?" "Painted nails?" "Make-up?" "Skin texture" "Skin Color" Something like that?

I love guides, but when people aren't even reading things like the rules or announcements that make life easier for them, why would they read the guides? The only people I feel that actually take the time to read guides are the people who are already "veterans". <_< That's my outlook on them anyway, which is why I neglect to write any myself, even though I love to read them. :|

The discussion thread is deceased for all practical purposes and I have yet to find a single RP guide that actually covers IC posting or plot writing to any significant depth, so claiming that there is any real way to self-study your way to being a good RPer with those is questionable to say the least.

Argh, the discussion thread was just a pent up building of frustration. It's like, you'd tell people this was wrong, that was wrong, and then they'd do a crap job of improving. It was a total failure, and most of the people posting in there had no reason to. <_< Their plots were good enough for people to move along with anyway.

Self-study is really the only way to improve in PC right now though. I mean, before it was a breeze to get better; We had a really good bulk of 'advanced', 'intermediate', and 'beginner' roleplayers. Intermediate roleplayers were like, the lifespan of the RP section; the people who didn't mind roleplaying with anybody, as long as they had acceptable grammar. But we lost the 'intermediates' or they were absorbed into the 'advanced', and now the valley between the top and bottom is a gaping crack in the planet. :| So there blows the idea of self-study.

I dunno, I'm just rambling on about nothing at this point. xD;

I do have a little idea I want to try though, but I need to talk it over with the RP owner, because I'm a terrible RP master, so even if I wanted to start an RP to see the different levels and help some people improve, I can't. xD!

Well, I'm one of those newb RP'ers everyone is complaining about. I did a little RPing on some different forums, but those were highly unregulated, and well, crappy. And while I did read the rules and checked out all the links in the "The NEW Useful Links for New RPers" (the ones that worked, anyways), and I have to say most of them were pretty helpful. But if as far as "guides" go, if there aren't any better/ other ones, then it might help if those better/other ones were compiled. If there aren't, then oh well. I suppose I am in the minority as far as new RP'ers who read the rules and guides go, which is kinda sad. Really. But the only people who I've ever found it to be really a pain to RP with were those who couldn't take the time to word a post with proper English.

Also, the Pokemon Roleplay section seems to be all but abandoned by those "veterans". Well, I suppose I can understand why.

Loki

August 8th, 2008, 07:55 PM

Well, I'm one of those newb RP'ers everyone is complaining about. I did a little RPing on some different forums, but those were highly unregulated, and well, crappy. And while I did read the rules and checked out all the links in the "The NEW Useful Links for New RPers" (the ones that worked, anyways), and I have to say most of them were pretty helpful. But if as far as "guides" go, if there aren't any better/ other ones, then it might help if those better/other ones were compiled. If there aren't, then oh well. I suppose I am in the minority as far as new RP'ers who read the rules and guides go, which is kinda sad. Really. But the only people who I've ever found it to be really a pain to RP with were those who couldn't take the time to word a post with proper English.

Also, the Pokemon Roleplay section seems to be all but abandoned by those "veterans". Well, I suppose I can understand why.

Well as far as guides go, the only ones I remember are ShadowFaith and Alter Ego's guides, and both of those are only Sign-up guides? Anyway, Alter Ego's guide is linked in the rules, but I'm not sure if it's only Other Roleplay. [/has a hard time keeping up with the edits on the rules for both sections. xD;;] (And I'm not under the impression that you're one of the newbs we're complaining about, since your grammar seems polished and your sentence structures are good. And you've read the rules and stuff, which earned a 'thank god people like this still exist' from me. xDD) You just need to add more bulk to your posts, is the only issue I'm seeing. I think AE is writing a 'four-lines-minimum' guide that might (I'm crossing my fingers) expand on making those super-ridiculously-long-god-like-essays that he writes on a regular basis, so you could probably check that out once he's done. ^^

As for PRP being abandoned by veterans, I definitely agree. But hopefully we can change that soon. :<

I was just recently re-reading the first few pages of this thread, (got a very good laugh at myself, and a very good re-evaluation on my level of intelligence which is seemingly very low) and I saw this:

The "Nice Character": I'm not sure if this has been mentioned already, but...have you ever come across the endlessly understanding, kind, and encouraging character who'll forgive everyone for everything every time without a shadow of a doubt but is always ready to kick evil butt? These would be the polar opposite of "troublemaker" characters, I guess, bordering on the Mary-Sue/Gary-Stu category but without the L33T battle skills of doom. I mean sure, getting along with the rest of the cast is all well and good, but let's draw the line somewhere, m'kay? No-one can always be complete and utter friends with everyone else in the group and always agree with everything they say, that's not human! <.< The worst thing is, these accursed leppers are really hard to pin down because they aren't really godmodding or powerplaying (Since they don't force others to like them or miraculously win every battle) and certainly aren't disrupting the plot. The fact that they are making you, personally, pull out your hair and scream "Can't you act normal even once?!" is unfortunately not a very good basis for kicking them out of the RP, so make sure to stamp these infernal pests out in the sign-up process. Trust me, it will save you a lot of frustrated hair-pulling later on.

I died of laughter, because as of the creation of Dimitri: GUILTYGUILTYGUILTY. (... well kind of.) This thread is amazingly helpful actually. Re-reading everything. Duck-pond RPing reminds me of YZ in so many ways harharhar~ and I'm just seeing all these things we used to gripe about, and it's interesting to see how many more of those things I'm guilty of now. I love this thread. Ozy. You no longer come to PC. But you are still a god for making this thread. <3333

Lusankya

August 9th, 2008, 04:57 AM

Well, I find it rather difficult to make four lines of text in a conversation. I suppose the rule helps more than it hinders by a long shot, but it's just awkward to have to have your character say an entire paragraph, or wonder idly about the distant future, or feel the soft breeze of the wind against his/her/its skin/fur, when in real life, a simple "Yes" or "No" would have done the trick just as well. It makes conversations almost ridiculous.

Alter Ego

August 9th, 2008, 08:32 AM

I died of laughter, because as of the creation of Dimitri: GUILTYGUILTYGUILTY. (... well kind of.) This thread is amazingly helpful actually. Re-reading everything. Duck-pond RPing reminds me of YZ in so many ways harharhar~ and I'm just seeing all these things we used to gripe about, and it's interesting to see how many more of those things I'm guilty of now. I love this thread. Ozy. You no longer come to PC. But you are still a god for making this thread. <3333

Well, I wouldn't fully place Dimitri under this since it's not like he actually feels complete and utter kinship with everyone. (I mean, Yuki bugs him, Soren's comment rubbed him the wrong way, and seeing an entire squad of dead soldiers didn't exactly provoke the most empathic of reactions) There's a difference between a character who plays nice to avoid trouble and someone who's a genuine Messiah 24/7.

Very true about the duck pond, though to be fair we didn't exactly drive anyone off with angry quacking, they just kind of...dropped out on their own accord. =O

Also, the Pokemon Roleplay section seems to be all but abandoned by those "veterans". Well, I suppose I can understand why.

Erm...yeah, if I saw something of decent quality with even a little bit of innovation to it (and which hasn't started yet) I'd probably lunge at this point, but sadly there are none to see. .__.

Well, I find it rather difficult to make four lines of text in a conversation. I suppose the rule helps more than it hinders by a long shot, but it's just awkward to have to have your character say an entire paragraph, or wonder idly about the distant future, or feel the soft breeze of the wind against his/her/its skin/fur, when in real life, a simple "Yes" or "No" would have done the trick just as well. It makes conversations almost ridiculous.

True enough, as not all characters are wordy, but there's still tone and expression that can be addressed in the 'short replies' case without going out on a completely ridiculous tangent. The character's emotional reaction to whatever the question is, reasoning behind the decision etc. (unless, of course, it's something completely trivial like "Coffee?") are another source of material. The problem with writing a post that is just "yes" is that...well, what the heck is anyone supposed to give in response to that? "Okay, then."? Short posts without any details to pick up on only lead to even shorter posts as the less detail you give the less the next IC writer will have to work with, requiring more creative work on their side to compensate for the lack thereof from the other's. :\

Anyhow, the situations where the amount of topics that you can reasonable address has really, truly, honestly been reduced to a 'yes/no' prompt is usually one where two RPers have gone on a posting spree and left everyone else behind, in which case it's time to cool your jets and let others add to the story too. =O

Good point all the same, I'll have to address that in the guide that Loki already mentioned. (Way to go adding performance pressure :| J/K)

Seconding the attitude thing. If you just join an RP on a 'meh, why not?' mindset then you're most likely not going to be posting very much (or well) for it either, whereas if you join in in with fanpersonish fervor then you'll most likely also be checking up on the RP frequently, thinking stuff up outside of the time when you're writing, and just generally be more motivated for it. For me, whether or not I'm happy with the character I signed up is also an important motivational factor, hence why I always take so long to type out my profiles. :3

Lusankya

August 9th, 2008, 11:44 AM

On the subject of roleplays of decent quality with even a little bit of innovation to it (well, at least I think it's of decent quality and somewhat innovative, but that's probably because I made it), I have a 3-page Word document containing the introduction for a roleplay I had been envisioning for a while now, but after the total and complete failure of my other roleplay, I want to get some feedback on the idea before I post it up. You can use the Roleplay Lounge for that, yes?

txteclipse

August 9th, 2008, 01:08 PM

True enough, as not all characters are wordy, but there's still tone and expression that can be addressed in the 'short replies' case without going out on a completely ridiculous tangent. The character's emotional reaction to whatever the question is, reasoning behind the decision etc. (unless, of course, it's something completely trivial like "Coffee?") are another source of material. The problem with writing a post that is just "yes" is that...well, what the heck is anyone supposed to give in response to that? "Okay, then."? Short posts without any details to pick up on only lead to even shorter posts as the less detail you give the less the next IC writer will have to work with, requiring more creative work on their side to compensate for the lack thereof from the other's.

I've been hawk-eyeing this conversation, and you bring up a good point. I'm brand new to RP'ing, and luck is the only thing that has saved me from asking yes/no questions or answering with a yes/no answer. So now what I'm going to try to do is, when my characters ask a question, I'll leave avenues open. Like "we could do this, or maybe this, or perhaps this." It gives the person responding a little more to work with.

That said, if you have to respond to a yes/no question, it would be a good time to add some description. Like a character checking his watch to see what time it is, or describing something important going on, or the like. Or even adding details to help with character building, like having a shy person hesitate or blush to maintain the character's persona in everyone's mind. This wouldn't always be a viable option, obviously, but it definitely would help with the "'yes,' so-and-so character answered." posts.

Master Electrician

August 9th, 2008, 06:18 PM

Ozy. You no longer come to PC. But you are still a god for making this thread. <3333

I wasn't aware that I didn't, but whatever. Seriously, folks, this is my re-introduction to PC's roleplaying community, in new account format. There was about two years where I didn't have the time to devote to RPing on two sites. PC got sacrificed, as RPing here was pretty much dead when I left. Now, I ironically lack the time to RP consistently on the other, so I decided to come back. Little rusty, but back.

Honestly, it gives me a new appreciation for breaking into the community, I never realized quite how tightly knit we were when I was here before. That, and I had no idea something I typed up in a fit of pique would actually evolve into something useful. :P

To be a little more germane, I'm honestly a little bugged by the number of franchise-based RPs I see in Other Roleplay. I'm also pretty happy that there plenty of original ones, but I much prefer to play in an original world than an fully established one. Try and come up with an idea to hook everyone, not just people who know the series.

Loki

August 9th, 2008, 10:57 PM

I wasn't aware that I didn't, but whatever. Seriously, folks, this is my re-introduction to PC's roleplaying community, in new account format. There was about two years where I didn't have the time to devote to RPing on two sites. PC got sacrificed, as RPing here was pretty much dead when I left. Now, I ironically lack the time to RP consistently on the other, so I decided to come back. Little rusty, but back.

Honestly, it gives me a new appreciation for breaking into the community, I never realized quite how tightly knit we were when I was here before. That, and I had no idea something I typed up in a fit of pique would actually evolve into something useful. :P

To be a little more germane, I'm honestly a little bugged by the number of franchise-based RPs I see in Other Roleplay. I'm also pretty happy that there plenty of original ones, but I much prefer to play in an original world than an fully established one. Try and come up with an idea to hook everyone, not just people who know the series.

OZY. O_O!

I don't believe I've ever been so glad to be proven wrong. You and your new account. Pffft. <_< So very misleading. But hey, you got the message! A generally positive outcome. And in the end, you are still god for making this thread.

As for Other Roleplay, I think Other Roleplay and Pokemon Roleplay kind of switch off. If one forum is really lively, the other one is pretty desolate. I dunno, Other Roleplay isn't seeing the same activity as before. But I do agree; I love original world RP's as much as I love series-based ones. But I think that handling an original world RP is more difficult than one that's already been thoroughly explained, so people just kind of opt out.

And actually, here's another one, in the lovely old-fashioned style.

Over-Cautious: I remember that the main problem with the old original RP's that I personally experienced, is that nobody wanted to take the liberty of making something happen. Or like, it was hard to describe where the character was or what they were doing because we weren't sure of the surroundings. I think RPer's that create original world plots should encourage their members to contribute their own ideas and such, and not just leave it up to the RP creator time after time. Assure them that they don't mind if they take the liberty of sitting down on a rock in what was originally imagined to be an empty field of wheat.

That's not so much a completely negative bad habit, but more like something that shouldn't be overdone. That would probably go hand-in-hand with a paragraph about the 'Anal RP Creator'. xD; I think it's much easier to continue the movement of an RP if everyone is able to take little liberties that everyone else will just be flexible with.

Lusankya

August 11th, 2008, 08:19 AM

Does anyone else feel that there are too many of the classic journey-style Pokemon RPs though? Frankly, the mere thought of joining one of them bores me...

Alter Ego

August 11th, 2008, 08:30 AM

Over-Cautious: I remember that the main problem with the old original RP's that I personally experienced, is that nobody wanted to take the liberty of making something happen. Or like, it was hard to describe where the character was or what they were doing because we weren't sure of the surroundings. I think RPer's that create original world plots should encourage their members to contribute their own ideas and such, and not just leave it up to the RP creator time after time. Assure them that they don't mind if they take the liberty of sitting down on a rock in what was originally imagined to be an empty field of wheat.

Haha, that's not just a phenomenon of original settings, you know. I remember one time in a journey RP where the cast was stuck in a pokémon center for one and a half pages because no-one dared to be the first to move it along. XD

And speaking of journey RPs...no kidding. They're everywhere, near-identical (right down to that weird system that seems to be in vogue right now) and often frequented by the same people too. I mean come on, one journey not enough for you guys? XD

PMD RPs are a close second in my book, and I have to admit that right now my incentive for joining either kind is truly null and void. :< This is not a modly decree or anything, but more variety would be nice.

txteclipse

August 11th, 2008, 08:33 AM

Does anyone else feel that there are too many of the classic journey-style Pokemon RPs though? Frankly, the mere thought of joining one of them bores me...

If I want that, I'll just play the actual game. It really is boring-sounding...

♥~*Abby*~♥

August 11th, 2008, 08:35 AM

If I want that, I'll just play the actual game. It really is boring-sounding...

Couldn't agree more, even though I am guilty of signing up for a few of them... ~_~

Alter Ego

August 11th, 2008, 08:40 AM

Meh, in the defense of journey RPs in general (for I am still an OT/Journey junkie at heart, and it is only with the greatest love that I bash down every fault within the genre I find <3), they can be good and entertaining when done right. It's just that when you have your basic cookie-cutter edition in large amounts it really starts getting old. :<

Ah well, RPers will be RPers. There used to be a similar phenomenon with pokémorph RPs a year or two back, as I recall, and now look at the section. None to be seen. XD

♥~*Abby*~♥

August 11th, 2008, 08:41 AM

Good point. A great example of a good journey thread is Oni Raichu's "A Journey". He only accepts good RPers, so it's a fun thread to post in. :D

The Mega Champion

August 11th, 2008, 01:57 PM

Wow... all these new posts took quite awhile to read...

Anyway... I pretty much agree with everything that has been said.

Journey RP's? Don't get me started. When a new RP pops up, I tend to check it, Journey or not. Guess what I've noticed? Pretty much what you guys have already said. The Journey RP's are all pretty much the same. No originality whatsoever.

As for PMD RP's... I'm just not into them. If I want to participate in a PMD RPG... I'll just replay one of the games! You know?

Meh. That's just my opinion...

Lusankya

August 11th, 2008, 05:25 PM

Pokemorph RP? O_O *googles Pokemorph and sighs in relief* Ah, well that's okay, but I guess now I need a new name for the so-called "Pokemorphs" in the RP idea I'm working on...

The Mega Champion

August 12th, 2008, 01:17 PM

Meh. I've always thought Pokemorph stuff was weird.

To weird for me anyway...

Lusankya

August 12th, 2008, 05:11 PM

Agreed, furries in general kinda creep me out. D:

Master Electrician

August 12th, 2008, 06:00 PM

I've always had a lot of fun with Pokemorph RPs. Of course, this was way back when, when it was a somewhat novel idea. Charm might've worn off with time, but it did provide for some good emotional drama.

SBaby

August 25th, 2008, 08:49 PM

Another bad habit is confusing forum RPs for table-top RPGs. Yes, I've had people think that D&D was played the same way as a table-top.

Darkhaven3

September 24th, 2008, 09:09 PM

Agreed, furries in general kinda creep me out. D:

I'd be willing to attribute that to your first experience with furries being a less than enjoyable one - possibly erotica or whatnot?

Blue Screen of Death

November 3rd, 2008, 04:06 PM

Are you defending furries? *looks at darkhaven3's avatar* that looks suspiciously like a furry, but edited in photoshop so nothing but the face shows.

Darkhaven3

November 30th, 2008, 02:33 PM

Yes, I am defending furries. Maybe you people should wake up to reality if you honestly think all furries do is make porn.

By the way, it was a Typhlosion before you reminded me my avatar was due for a change. Now it is a Renamon. They are both used in the fashion of furries (e.g. walk upright, are sentient). I'm sure this offends you massively, which I enjoy.

Something of note is to be said though, relevant to the thread; I often see myself posting at very inopportune times, rushing simply to get a post out and the quality of my writing suffers far too often because of this. Just a thought.

Blue Screen of Death

December 1st, 2008, 01:04 PM

I was not trying to be offensive, it was a simple question. I mentioned your avatar because, like I said, it looked like a furry that went through photoshop. I'm not saying furries are bad, just porno furries. And no, thar does not offend me in the least.

Wolfwhispers

December 25th, 2008, 11:33 AM

The problem with furries, is that there are so few true fans. There is a much higher percentage of 'fan girls'. That's how the problem arose, because strangely enough, all these people want a sexual character that fulfills their fantasies of fox ears or cat tails, which is sad since I like foxes and cats. But again, the type of furries you wouldn't like, Hippy, is the people who are more along the line of PWP (porn without plot). Because of this, there are very few worthwhile stuff with such things, ranging along the lines of RPs, fiction, fanfiction, art, ect.

And sorry if I sort of came out of nowhere, but this topic interested me. ^_^

Rabbit

December 25th, 2008, 06:59 PM

Furry anthro was my first love...blending my inability to draw faces and love of animals. There's quite a lot of good, 'clean' furry art out there. But there are volumes and volumes of furry porn... I've been called a sicko for my interest in furry anthro. -shrug- I can see why.

With visual art, you don't have to explain why your character is half lemur, half human. Not so in roleplays. Sadly, most Pokemorph RPs lack a good, solid explanation for the presence of anthropomorphic characters. Scientists fiddling around with genetics...unscrupulous people using the 'power' of Pokemon...nuclear accidents...it's not very logical. In the end, the authors just want to slap Pokemon characteristics on a human frame, like modern Frankensteins, and make the beast live. Actually, I'd prefer it if they didn't try to justify the idea of Pokemorphs. Just say "that's the way things are" and write a world without humans or Pokemon.

GFA

January 21st, 2009, 05:57 PM

Another bad habit is confusing forum RPs for table-top RPGs. Yes, I've had people think that D&D was played the same way as a table-top.

Please elaborate, for I am confused. I've played D&D multiple times, and I was pretty sure it was a table-top game...

NeonFire

February 21st, 2009, 08:42 AM

Hey, thanks for the advice! :D
I used to role-play on forums outside of Pokecommunity, but these role-plays seem more advanced and I need all the help I can get. ^-^

OokamiShipper

March 6th, 2009, 08:35 PM

When people's characters tend to be unbeatable and perfect.
Ugh, I really don't like that. People, no one's perfect! Your characters are no acceptions! They need at least some weaknesses or flaws!

NOTE: This isn't really directed to anyone, but I just wanted to vent out this bad habit that kinda makes roleplaying no fun. Dx

Alysa

March 8th, 2009, 08:26 AM

I agree with you at the most point about everything, except I am a little bit sketchy on the elemental rule. Though I do not role play as an elemental, I would just like to say that not all personalities reflect the element that they are. Some Elementals could have a Firey personality, and be quite calm and quiet, while a water may have a sketchy, angery personality.

It should depend on what the person want's thier charicter to be and not how you want it.

By all means this is my opinion and I hope you do not take me too seriously, but I, in turn think that way. I will, anyway abide by your rules seeing as they are enforced.

Alysa

I Laugh at your Misfortune!

March 8th, 2009, 08:38 AM

I agree with you at the most point about everything, except I am a little bit sketchy on the elemental rule. Though I do not role play as an elemental, I would just like to say that not all personalities reflect the element that they are. Some Elementals could have a Firey personality, and be quite calm and quiet, while a water may have a sketchy, angery personality.

It should depend on what the person want's thier charicter to be and not how you want it.

By all means this is my opinion and I hope you do not take me too seriously, but I, in turn think that way. I will, anyway abide by your rules seeing as they are enforced.

Alysa

Though I've never roleplayed as an elemental, I agree with this. I wouldn't, for example, have all my water types as cool, calm and collected. After all, have you ever heard of a little thing called Gyarados?

The Scientist

March 22nd, 2009, 03:25 PM

From Forever's "If you were a mod for a day..." thread.

I'd mod Pokemon/Other RP and instaban anyone who made a character with 3 or more of the following traits:

Appearance:
Long black hair that covers piercing red/green/blue eyes
Wears only black, unrealistic clothing with a skull chain/pendant/wristband/pattern on shirt

History:
Parents dead, going out for revenge on the murderers
Parents alive and neglected the character
Somehow "raised themselves" from age 1 to 16
Was raised as an assassin, and by age 10 was the deadliest person alive

Personality:
Depressed/antisocial/hates everyone and everything
Has no friends, ignores everything

Other:
Has a supernatural control over the "power of darkness"
Is absurdly thin, but never loses in a fight because (s)he has so much pent-up hostility

Granted, there may be some situations where it's warranted, But seriously, stuff like this makes me RAGE.

Some of them are more acceptable than others, but when EVERY FREAKING CHARACTER is a "dark, mysterious" type who was abandoned by their parents as an infant and raised as an assassin by a secret society, and wears a skull pendant that has some deep, historical significance...

Yeah... I've seen RPs where people use allusions to other things, but that go too far.

Such as a person that happens to have a suited armour, and regenerative shielding (Halo), whos name is also John and having genetic augmentations. This has occured when the GM of a post was looking for a character that was canonically correct to the specific RP (not Halo related).

Or another one I've seen is where people will say their character has bi-specled glasses, and a funny scar on their forehead (a la Harry Potter), maybe even have the first name Harry, when the RP has nothing to do with the Harry Potter univese, not that it would, but rather the ideas of lack of imagination in character design is somewhat distressing...

Dark Mike

April 7th, 2009, 02:19 AM

I agree with the above but I also raise the issue that,
Nobody's RP character can truly be original.
I mean, in your character design you are always going to incorperate things you've seen elsewhere.
And... whatever you make as already been done before by someone else.
;)

Ninetales

April 7th, 2009, 09:06 PM

Dark Mike is correct in saying that no character is truly original. However, Tristin and Feign are also correct in saying that lame ripoffs or shallow, overused characters are unacceptable. It's just that some characters can seem like ripoffs or shallow stereotypes at first glance, then when you look at their signup, they turn out to be very original and interesting--that the signup has a creative twist to it.

For example, one character I saw Trainer Kat use in an RPG was a boy named Takuya. He seemed like the stereotypical emo at first glance (and also had the "absurdly thin yet never loses due to pent-up hostility" and "long black hair hiding piercing eyes" characteristics Tristin mentioned), but he actually had a definite depth to him, and was obviously well-thought out. A character can be fairly stereotypical, but as long as he or she has other aspects that make that character interesting, it's just fine.

In another example, my favourite character to RP is a thief named Lupin, who has a red-headed girlfriend. Now, some people might glance at my signup and say, "Oh great, looks like someone's ripping off Lupin III." I may have drawn one or two inspirations from that, but the resemblance between the two Lupins is also quite coincidental. After discovering the similarities (and slapping myself on the forehead of course), I tried to make it so that my Lupin was very different in things like appearance, personality, and history from the other Lupin. Not to mention I put a lot of depth and thought into his character. Well, so far all the feedback I got on Lupin's signups and RPG posts was far from negative, so I guess I'm okay in that respect.

Moral of the story: Any character can become a good character with enough depth and originality added.

*Note: "Depth" in this case refers to how much detail is put into the aspects of the character, as well as how real the character seems (that is, it can't be overpowered).

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
In other news...
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Now, another thing I'd like to add is on the topic of RPing unoriginal characters. For example, I've seen many Super Mario RPGs where you have to RP as Mario, Peach, Yoshi, Toad, etc instead of creating your own character. I've also seen a couple of people put Cloud into a non-Final Fantasy RPG, for instance. Unoriginal characters can be fun to RP, but too frequently I see people writing really skimpy signups for them, or in worse cases, not posting a signup at all and saying things like "I'm going to RP as Sabrina" instead. This can get frustrating because A) people might be unfamiliar with the character, and B) if someone is unwilling or unable to describe their character very well, chances are they can't do a good job of RPing them. And of course that usually turns out to be the case--those people's posts tend to be sub-par.

However, I'm not saying that RPing an unoriginal character should be discouraged. Like I said, it can be fun. In fact, soon I'm hoping to start an RPG where you have the option of using an existing video game character. But when people sign these characters up, they must assume that the other people in the RPG know nothing about the character beforehand, no matter how popular he or she is. The only exception to that rule is if the RPG is based in the world that character is from (for example, if someone RPs a Pokemon in a Pokemon RPG, which I'm sure most RPers here have done at least once; or if someone plays as Cyborg in a Teen Titans RPG).

But even for those exceptions, I find it lame if someone omits a signup. For those "native characters", I suggest at least posting a little bit about the character's personality, and a little bit of history that relates it to the RPG (for example, how they ended up in the situation described in the RPG). This is especially true for Pokemon, even if they just accompany a trainer. I give big mental kudos to people who post additional information on their Pokemon besides just a species (even things as little as a nickname or a sentence of personality), and to RPG masters who include a mini-signup form for each Pokemon and nag people if they don't complete it.

For unoriginal characters that are not being RP'd in their world, a signup is just as essential as that of an original character. Besides, if someone puts a lot of detail into such a signup, that lets the other people know that the person really cares about the character and can do a good job of RPing them. Besides, if it was one of your favourite characters, wouldn't you be glad to write about what they're like anyway?

The Mega Champion

April 8th, 2009, 12:07 PM

Hey guys. I have a question.

In my last RP, The GM/Moderator of the RP disappeared and never came back, so it was axed/canceled.

But... you see... I really liked the character I was using. My OT. I didn't want to get rid of the character, so, I kept it in my documents on my computer.

If another RP shows up that I like (which seems doubtful at this point) is it okay if I use that same character?

I never finished an RP with that character. I want to finish an RP with this character before trashing it.

Is it okay if I reuse this character for a future RP?

Any help/advice would be appreciate in this.

Thanks guys.

Feign

April 8th, 2009, 12:37 PM

Hey guys. I have a question.

In my last RP, The GM/Moderator of the RP disappeared and never came back, so it was axed/canceled.

But... you see... I really liked the character I was using. My OT. I didn't want to get rid of the character, so, I kept it in my documents on my computer.

If another RP shows up that I like (which seems doubtful at this point) is it okay if I use that same character?

I never finished an RP with that character. I want to finish an RP with this character before trashing it.

Is it okay if I reuse this character for a future RP?

Any help/advice would be appreciate in this.

Thanks guys.

It is indeed okay to keep the same character (assuming it still follows the rules of the new person's RP).

In some different RP forums, some people will only RP one character, wherein after RPing, the experience from one RP would be added to their history (thus your character develops).

Its up to you, if you'd like to include your character's history in the now closed RP.

The Mega Champion

April 9th, 2009, 12:26 PM

It is indeed okay to keep the same character (assuming it still follows the rules of the new person's RP).

In some different RP forums, some people will only RP one character, wherein after RPing, the experience from one RP would be added to their history (thus your character develops).

Its up to you, if you'd like to include your character's history in the now closed RP.

Okay. Thanks.

I'll try to remember that. ^_^'

Vindicated

April 18th, 2009, 10:39 AM

Uncreative characters can fit into certain RPs. I mean if you have a super mario RP what are you supposed to RP as? Your own made up Italian human thing? Or a made up dino? Yes uncreative characters is normally frowned upon, but they can also fit. Nintales pretty much is completely right.

I guess the thing I have noticed most on this forums RP area ( I haven't been here too long) but there are tons of RPs dead by the 50-100 post range. It seems that some people end up joining an RP get excited for it then when the next wave of accepted RPs come in they join 2 out of the 3 accepted and get over their heads in work. I guess what I am saying is a very bad habit of roleplayers is to migrate from RP to RP.

Katachu

June 13th, 2009, 09:43 PM

I don't discourage uncreative characters, because some people don't really know how to develop characters. Many people that visit sites like these are young and inexperienced. It's our job to teach them how to make their characters grow into something worth-while. However, OC characters based off of, or related to a character that you have not created yourself, is pretty annoying. Actually try and come up with something different.

However, if you're going to take my character, that I may have spent months fine-tuning, without permission, I would get pretty mad.

Conversely, if I reuse a character for a different RP, it's not that I'm trying to use a "cookie cutter" character, it's more of the idea that I need to know my characters inside and out. I need to spend more time with them, and RPs are the easiest place to do that, or is that not allowed?

I have a good link to a "Mary Sue Litmus Test" which covers a lot of these pet-peeves, but I'm not allowed to post links yet, so if you PM me, I can dig it up, or I can post it later.

Cirrus

June 13th, 2009, 09:47 PM

A link to a Litmus test is provided already in one of the Help threads, I believe. Unfortunately, I have also succumbed partially to that bad habit of migration, but it's mostly under control now. I think it's a measure of self-control that one must exhibit, as with all things that one cares for.

Down with the darkness

June 13th, 2009, 10:32 PM

For some reason I seem to be a bunny magnet. In 2/3 of the RP's II've been in on this forum someones tried to bunny me.

Frostbiteकर्म

June 13th, 2009, 10:40 PM

I hate it when the RP Master (or GM, whichever you prefer to refer to them as) think they're soooo powerful just because they run the thread and they give themselves everything. Such as the good Pokemon (I mean like more than 1 in a post...like 2 or something at the same time and without even an amazing post, if it was amazing that would be fine), amazing skills, and stuff like that. I hate it when people get all arrogant. I'm not sure if I'm arrogant, but if I am I try not to be. Ok, I'm done with my little rant now.

The Gaurdian

June 23rd, 2009, 10:09 PM

I hate it when the title is somthing like [RolePlayTitle]: !!!CLOSED!!! and yet people still post sign ups...

Bright Colors!(do you see what I did there?)
and i hate it when people post only in yellow, (<- please highlight that if you cant see that it says "YELLOW") Green, Blue, Or grey. (green, blue, or grey.) because my eyesight is not that great, and when they do this, I just bothers me, I mean really, Why should I have to highlight a post just to read it?

SHUN THE NON DESCRIBERS!
I also hate people that will NOT describe anything, "He walked into a room." is not something I do, Infact my HWIAR is more like, "He walked into a large room with twenty pillers or so that rose to the roof. The room was incased in darkness and they could see nothing... [please imput more here,]" And then I will go into a LONG disciption of the room.

N00B/L337 SP34K.
4|\|D \/\/4|-|7 15 7|-|15? |0|. If I have to get my brother to even do that, then what makes you think I can read it, I know the "WHAT" and "IS" but when a entire post is like this, I cant UNDERSTAND YOU!

Missingno.7-4468

June 24th, 2009, 10:23 AM

To add on to the cliché characters, I am getting really annoyed with appearances that go something like this:

"...He has long, spiky brown hair that, when wet, goes down to the bottom of his neck..."

Seriously, one more of these, and I'm gonna kill myself(not really).

I Laugh at your Misfortune!

June 24th, 2009, 01:08 PM

To add on to the cliché characters, I am getting really annoyed with appearances that go something like this:

"...He has long, spiky brown hair that, when wet, goes down to the bottom of his neck..."

Seriously, one more of these, and I'm gonna kill myself(not really).

That's what my hair is like, though XD

I just hate it when people's characters are such Mary-Sues and they CAN'T see it D:

Roxasabridged

June 24th, 2009, 01:45 PM

I hate RP'ers that travel along with another character(s) and disappear randomly when they're needed. It tends to grind RP's to a halt.

Feign

June 24th, 2009, 02:54 PM

I just hate it when people's characters are such Mary-Sues and they CAN'T see it D:

I think they don't really care at this point, though I bet they'd still want to RP.

I've seen it where someone was basically RPing a Halo clone, and tweaking some things to fit the storyline/genre, and we kept persuading this guy to change it up, to which he failed to do. Not that he said he wouldn't, but that he posted his next post anyway, as though nothing had happened. Needless to say, he was booted out.

Eletj

July 7th, 2009, 04:24 AM

Okay, I need to rant.

I hate it when people sign-up to an RP with a bad sign up. Not you're everyday, just passing the limits, I mean where it seems like they don't even try. Heres an example, I'll use a Sign-up from my current RP:

Sign Ups:
Name: Fred
Age: 15
Appearance: Brown hair. Blue eyes. 6"5. Yellow T-shirt with blue sneakers and jeans.
Personality: Hes is a fun guy, who is really friendly.
History: Born in Johto. Lived in Kanto. Mum died in accident.
Pokemon: Piplup
RP Sample: Fred went for a run in the morning, but tripped up and hurt his knee. he couldn't yell for help, so he crawld his way home. his dad asked him waht happened.

It's these kind of Sign-ups that make me want to yell into the computer screen and throw things. But I remain calm, and type decline in bright red letters. Anyway, thats my 2 cents. Thank you, and Good Night.

CrystallineSeraphim

July 18th, 2009, 01:52 AM

Hmm... there seems to be alot of hatred for so many stereotypes of bad/terrible roleplayers... I have roleplayed for a few years on Gaia Online and it helps me greatly with my roleplaying experience... I can not have a good day unless I get to at least roleplay a little bit. I am also mostly patient with one roleplayer I roleplay with in a relatively dead Kingdom Hearts RP Guild... he sometimes isn't a good roleplayer... in that he doesn't use the right captialization or Punctuation sometimes and he mostly has his posts in red for actions and dark red for speech... however, it is easy for me to read it. However, I have a dreadful habit of posting in a 10pt text size on Gaia Online but then again... so many other roleplayers there do. I am slowly trying to improve his roleplaying... so far we are doing this arc together, my character Hikaru, has been possessed by his alternate personality Hiroaki and is force to fight against Shinoko (my friend's character), and now they are suspended in the air above a dark oceans whose water shimmers like quicksilver due to the light of a dark sun.

As for you guys hating furries? WTF? I am a member of alot of Naruto Roleplaying Guilds on Gaia Online and in Naruto: Shinobi Changes, I have a clan of ninjas who have childish personalities and are eternally young from the moment they turn 18 but are mostly incontient or infantilist but have the power to generate, control and manipulate kinetic energy at will... guess what I called this kekkei genkai... I called it Reverse Rebirth. This was before clyde reset the freaking roleplay so I have to get my characters and clans reapproved, however, I have 2 characters in that clan... Takato and Naoto Matsuki, they are distant cousins to each other but the pictures I used for them are basically anime character's diapered... Takato is Manta from Shaman King and Naoto is Naoto from FLCL.

Don't flame at me for revealing that... I am not infantilist in anyway... I just love a really good roleplay...

I have one more stereotype...

The Swearing Roleplayer of DOOM: (Sorry for the name... meh) These are basically people who love to freaking swear like there is no tomorrow in their Roleplaying Posts... they are freaking annoying and they start swearing their freaking heads off at you for something that put them at a disadvantage even though what you did was totally legal in the guild roleplay rules... and they then resort to god-modding. I put up with it up until the point where they nearly kill my character through god-modding... and then I report them to a guild moderator... but it has even happened to me when I am the freaking guild captain, and they totally ignore that fact, I give them about 4 chances (I am leniant so what), until I ban them... but then they start spamming me with PMs and then create a new account so they can join back up into the guild and then doing the same cycle again... up until the point where you report them to the Gaia Moderators... I have never done that... except when someone for some freaking reason posted freaking disturbing graphically morbid images in a PM to me... and I had never seen that user before...

Also... I am guilty of trying to induce random suspense in a RP called Pokemon: Inner Spirit... my character's inner pokemon is a Glaceon named Kara and he is being hunted by his chaotic older brother Makoto, who killed nearly everyone in his village but Hikaru somehow escaped to a glacial island near the pokemon world... living in perfect harmony with the elements of ice and water of the island, in complete solitude, until others come to the island through unknown means... this was the most recent post I had in that RP on these forums...
"Obviously he isn't one of Makoto's goons..." Kara said to Hikaru telepathically, as Hikaru started to get up, and when he heard Lewis, Hikaru's energy wings disappeared in a dispersing of tiny blue particles, then Hikaru responded by saying "Greetings... welcome to my island". Lewis would notice that Hikaru was only wearing a short-sleeved t-shirt and blue cargo jeans, strange clothing for being on an island which was like a winter wonderland, like a perpetual land of ice and water, Hikaru was at home here, in tune with the elements of water and ice. Hikaru spun around when he heard a rustling in the grass nearby and then a figure burst out, wielding a large katana as a weapon. Hikaru instantly reacted and gathered a large amount of his psionic energy and a large quantity of ice elemental energy around his fist and then charged at the figure.

The energy was also streaming to behind Hikaru from his fist up until the point where his fist collided with the attacker's katana, then there was a large burst of light as the energy around Hikaru's fist intensified and Hikaru roared telepathically "Kami no Itte (Hand of God)". The katana then shattered from the pressure of the psionic and elemental energy on the blade's structure, both physical and molecular. Then Hikaru followed through with his attack, striking his opponent directly in the face, at which, Hikaru discharged the psionic and elemental energy into his opponent, and doing so, flung his opponent high into the sky, probably heading back towards the mainland... probably millions of kilometres away.

Hikaru smirked and the energies dispersed from his fist and then he turned around to face Lewis, saying nothing, but gave a look that obviously meant that Lewis should follow Hikaru... and quickly... if he valued his freedom

I really want you to rate me on that... and hopefully I am not a stereotyped roleplayer

Monochrome

July 18th, 2009, 09:07 AM

Agh the only problem with SU's is that whether or not you realize the only interesting SUs are Mary-Sues and its the only way someone has enough space for a SU... And I demand a single example of a SU that is very interesting but doesn't use a recycled character background, follow some stereotype,god mod, or Mary Sue, it can't be done, trust me I've tried, it's impossible.....

And as far as swearing goes, I don't know... I feel like if my character is an eighteen your old who just got beaten or punched in the face or surprised he should be allowed to swear, I know I would..... I mean its not that amazingly rare for people to swear, its only realistic as far as personalities go... I mean its a little out there but so is a magical universe filled with magical creatures that ten year old children use to **** (Chicken) fight with....

And dude your post is just fine... Don't even sweat it.....

I DO hate it when people take a chapter and completely butcher it, or get mad at an RP masters completely fair decision...

.Ozymandias

July 18th, 2009, 10:27 AM

I have to say that my two biggest gripes with roleplayers are:-

1) When there's a specific part of my character that makes the storyline you create pointless. (I had a character inable to get pregnant, and the RPer in mind got her pregnant - without even telling me. She just put it in there)

2) When a player plays every single character exactly the same.

Alter Ego

July 19th, 2009, 03:22 AM

CrystallineSeraphim? There's actually a specific discussion thread (http://www.pokecommunity.com/showthread.php?t=185160) for characters and posts. You might want to try posting that there.

Agh the only problem with SU's is that whether or not you realize the only interesting SUs are Mary-Sues and its the only way someone has enough space for a SU... And I demand a single example of a SU that is very interesting but doesn't use a recycled character background, follow some stereotype,god mod, or Mary Sue, it can't be done, trust me I've tried, it's impossible.....

Ask and you shall receive... (http://www.pokecommunity.com/showpost.php?p=3732411&postcount=13) (at least, manipulative sociopath born from a completely normal, healthy family is not a character type I have seen a lot of here)

Yeah, if you grossly misdefine a Mary-Sue then no, there aren't any, but the thing is...having a recycled background or one unusual trait does not immediately turn a character Sue. Mary-Sue happens when loads upon loads of improbabilities converge on a single character, usually coupled with a larger helping of blatant plagiarism, all for the purpose of making them cool. Of course there is something someone else has already done in any given character. People have been conceiving characters for generations, so it would be highly improbable that any given character type would not have already been explored by someone else. That doesn't mean, however, that you can't take a fairly regular base and put a clearly non-main stream spin on it. It may not be 100% totally original, but it will be original enough to be interesting.

A Mary Sue, the way I define it, however, is never interesting. Why? Because it usually consist of only the most blatantly overused and recycled materials without even a shred of originality or interest-creating flaws and shortcomings. It is the kind of character you will find by the dozens if you plunge into the average pile of n00b fanfiction. :\

And I'm going to throw in two of my own woes while I'm at it.

Roleplay fads

Back when I first got into RPing here, it was pokémorph RPs. Then it went to school RPs, skip ahead some and we have the trainer card craze which is still lurking around, an now it's generic journey and chapter format. Is it really so hard to...oh, I dunno', make an RP about something there isn't already a dozen RPs on? Playing with the cookier cutter is no way to be. u-u

Chapter Roleplaying

...okay, I know that RPing is sometimes called 'co-operative fanfiction', but this is taking a loose metaphor far too literally. A roleplay is not a fanfic. They are still two different genres. A fanfic is a piece of writing where the plot is at the center and the characters are made to serve it; an RP is a piece of writing where the characters are the center and the plot is made to serve them. Conventions from one side should not be imported to the other. :\

Yes, I know that writing these massive interactions that are all between your own characters is good for buffing up post length, but the bottom line is that that's not roleplaying. Roleplaying is when the characters of different players actually interact with each other. Allow me to emphasize: different players. You can write an interaction orgy with 15 of your own characters, but unless someone in there is interacting with someone else's character, it's really not roleplaying. RPing is not a one-man show; if you want that, write fanfiction.

And that is why I find the notion of restricting people to 'one post per location, then it moves on :D' is just...insane, really. You can't make any meaningful interaction out of that. Heck, you can't make interaction at all, and if there's no interaction, what we really have is not so much a roleplay as a collection of people writing mediocre fanfiction in the same thread. It defeats the whole point of a roleplay.

Just...let's keep our genres straight, shall we? Every time you call your RP post a 'chapter', one of my brain cells dies as a result of me banging my head against the keyboard. Please, have mercy on the brain cells. u_u

Monochrome

July 19th, 2009, 07:07 AM

Well Alter Ego I dont know.... A spiky redhaired kid who has little feelings at all accept for one thing in particular (COUGH-AXEL-COUGH) sounds kinda done to me... Especially the whole... HE WAS RICH BUT PSSHHHT HES AN EMO KID... In reality if you grow up rich the only way you would hate it is if it kept you from anything.... I dont know that sounds relatively generic to me... kind of out there... Really Really out there... but yeahs it's more origional than most SUs I've seen in my lifetime but I don't know... It still has a sense of genericism to me...

(By the way I dont mean to like shoot you down and be a jerk or anything Alter Ego, I just like making a good argument, sorry if this makes you made or something)

And about Chapter format Roleplays.... I don't know, so far in my experience I'm given a lot of freedom in those roleplays and they seem to last much longer, something about being given some sort of general direction that is constant makes me happy... In non chapter roleplays they continue to tell you what must be done but are so ague you dont know if you are making a mistake that can majorly afect the story... Very few roleplays have found a way around that, Pokemon Transformation (http://www.pokecommunity.com/showthread.php?t=182762) being one... Sadly I wasnt fast enough a poster to catch up with everyone XD... In certain Chapter roleplays I've found a lot of teaming up and freedom... In §acred†Beo!'s toleplays he plays off the characters Histories and past posts in order to formulate future... Individual chapters, in which the trainers can (By request) Team up... Thats how my pair ShadowYashi teamed up and vecane friends...

Alter Ego

July 19th, 2009, 07:34 AM

Well Alter Ego I dont know.... A spiky redhaired kid who has little feelings at all accept for one thing in particular (COUGH-AXEL-COUGH) sounds kinda done to me... Especially the whole... HE WAS RICH BUT PSSHHHT HES AN EMO KID... In reality if you grow up rich the only way you would hate it is if it kept you from anything.... I dont know that sounds relatively generic to me... kind of out there... Really Really out there... but yeahs it's more origional than most SUs I've seen in my lifetime but I don't know... It still has a sense of genericism to me...

...let's not even talk about personality in a character who does a full 360 degree turn between games. First appearance Axel is seriously not the same as the second one in anything but apperance.

And also, that's not an emo kid you are looking at. It's a bona-fide sociopath (I got PM clarifications on his background). He's not moping over life and existence itself. He's not being 'boohoo, my parents don't understand me/abused me/whatever'; he just plain lacks empathy as a birth defect. Which is also why he was not happy with his loving family and why he's out to conquer the world. I am not even remotely seeing the Axel Resemblance here.

As for hairstyles...seriously, there is not a single even vaguely functional hairstyle in this world that's not overdone. To call a character 'generic' based on that is really going out on a limb. oO

(By the way I dont mean to like shoot you down and be a jerk or anything Alter Ego, I just like making a good argument, sorry if this makes you made or something)

...umm, that's okay? I didn't really see your point with the comparison (as you picked a character I really wouldn't compare to this one), as you can probably see from above. So don't worry; whatever bullet you fired, it did not cause me injury. I think you need to fine-tune your aim. ;P

BUT, I shall indulge in detailed argument. And don't worry; I enjoy a good one as much as you do, so I won't cry if you won't. *kung-fu pose*

And about Chapter format Roleplays.... I don't know, so far in my experience I'm given a lot of freedom in those roleplays and they seem to last much longer, something about being given some sort of general direction that is constant makes me happy... In non chapter roleplays they continue to tell you what must be done but are so ague you dont know if you are making a mistake that can majorly afect the story... Very few roleplays have found a way around that, Pokemon Transformation (http://www.pokecommunity.com/showthread.php?t=182762) being one... Sadly I wasnt fast enough a poster to catch up with everyone XD... In certain Chapter roleplays I've found a lot of teaming up and freedom... In §acred†Beo!'s toleplays he plays off the characters Histories and past posts in order to formulate future... Individual chapters, in which the trainers can (By request) Team up... Thats how my pair ShadowYashi teamed up and vecane friends.

...I can honestly say I don't quite follow what you're trying to say here, because of purely grammatical reasons, so sorry if I'm misinterpreting you on some point below.

1. Yes, people can make mistakes, but that's what RP masters are there for; to prevent them and mop up when they do happen. It's not that hard to have a person edit their post. I've run non-chapter RPs for the entirety of my RPing time and never had them derail because of mistakes. If you were in an RP with an RP master who couldn't do their job, then that's a fault of the host; not the format.

The 'vagueness' you describe is an RPer's freedom of choice, by the way, so if you want to argue about getting 'freedoms' in RPing, I'm going to stick to my guns and say that one where you are not yanked about from one locale to another on a post count leash is by far more flexible. Also, in a well-written RP, the only 'wrong' is the kind that directly contradicts established circumstances. RP plots can be altered in mid-RP to accomodate player decisions (and often end up better and more interesting as a result of doing so). Again, there is less 'wrong' and more 'options' in non-chaptered format, because said format hasn't set a specific route everyone most follow down in stone before the first post is even made.

2. So...you are saying chaptered roleplays are good because you can make specific requests to the RP master about things that non-chaptered RPs let you do except without the need to request first? Yeeeeeah...give me a moment to figure out why that supports your point and not mine. I also seriously can't see any detailed interaction coming out of one to three posts post on each side, not unless the RPers plan out the exchange in advance and puppet each others' characters, which is just a pointlessly elaborate way of doing what non-chapter RPs do spontaneously.

3. About longevity? I don't know your record, but one of my non-chapter RPs lasted over two years. And even then, it only really went down because I myself lost interest. I'd say that's a decent lifespan, wouldn't you?

Yes, chaptered may be a bit easier on the RP master on account of being rigidly focused by default, but that ease of use comes at the penalty of offering far less RPer freedom, far lower quality of interaction, and generally cutting down on all the things that differentitate RPs from Fanfiction to begin with. The only reason a non-chaptered one would do worse is because of incompetence on the RP master's part, but then...incompetence is not something you can get rid of without allowing yourself the possibility to make mistakes and correct them.

...so yeah, if you wish to make a good argument, please do so. This one does not yet convince.

Monochrome

July 19th, 2009, 07:59 AM

(I'm sorry for my terrible grammar, I'm really sick right now and couldn't get any sleep last night. I will try my best to make it so I don't make to many others.)

1. Yes, people can make mistakes, but that's what RP masters are there for; to prevent them and mop up when they do happen. It's not that hard to have a person edit their post. I've run non-chapter RPs for the entirety of my RPing time and never had them derail because of mistakes. If you were in an RP with an RP master who couldn't do their job, then that's a fault of the host; not the format.What I meant for Non-chapter format roleplays is that many RP Masters have a specific plan for exactly what they want to happen in the roleplay but then end up leaving it open for many of the Roleplayers. It isn't the format that is the problem, with a good RP master and a good story the roleplay can succeed. More often than not sadly that isn't the case and people either overpower themselves by breaking the roleplays rules or going against the RP master initial idea. I've also noticed that non-chapter roleplays tend to lead to bunnying and conflict among the roleplayers. I do agree with you in a sense about this one.<--- Once again this is all from my own experiences.

2. So...you are saying chapter roleplays are good because you can make specific requests to the RP master about things that non-chaptered RPs let you do except without the need to request first? Yeeeeeah...give me a moment to figure out why that supports your point and not mine. I also seriously can't see any detailed interaction coming out of one to three posts post on each side, not unless the RPers plan out the exchange in advance and puppet each others' characters, which is just a pointlessly elaborate way of doing what non-chapter RPs do spontaneously.That wasn't what I was trying to say at all, but I can understand why you would think that it was. I was merely trying to say there is a level of interaction in chapter roleplays too and saying that there isn't is just completely ridiculous...

3. About longevity? I don't know your record, but one of my non-chapter RPs lasted over two years. And even then, it only really went down because I myself lost interest. I'd say that's a decent lifespan, wouldn't you? I see, you've also probably been roleplaying much longer than I and have much more experience, in my experience though my longest roleplay lasted about 5 or 6 months (I think XD) and was in chapter format. I guess I have just been much more lucky with chapter format.

Your a very aggressive arguer XD

(I'm sorry if I said one was better than the other.. I don't think I ever said that but meh... PS- I'm really enjoying this argument but this is starting to deviate from the subject of this section.. I know your moderator but is it cool if we clog this thread with our Argument? Would you rather continue it in PMing or do you think its relevant enough?)

Alter Ego

July 19th, 2009, 09:12 AM

(I'm sorry for my terrible grammar, I'm really sick right now and couldn't get any sleep last night. I will try my best to make it so I don't make to many others.)

Oh dear, that would explain it wouldn't it...

...well, that's appreciated. ^^

What I meant for Non-chapter format roleplays is that many RP Masters have a specific plan for exactly what they want to happen in the roleplay but then end up leaving it open for many of the Roleplayers. It isn't the format that is the problem, with a good RP master and a good story the roleplay can succeed. More often than not sadly that isn't the case and people either overpower themselves by breaking the roleplays rules or going against the RP master initial idea. I've also noticed that non-chapter roleplays tend to lead to bunnying and conflict among the roleplayers. I do agree with you in a sense about this one.<--- Once again this is all from my own experiences.

Well, again, this is where the mettle of the RP master is tested. Yes, derailment can happen, but that's the point where the RP master must put their whip to good use and bring the RPers back into line. My problem with chapter format still is the rigidity. It's got this narrowly defined path like one of the GBA games where whatever 'decisions' you make have no overall impact on the storyline. Eh...tried that format out to get the first-hand experience, and I just found it stifling and frustrating, to be honest. It was like 'why am I even here? I'm not making anything happen.'.

That wasn't what I was trying to say at all, but I can understand why you would think that it was. I was merely trying to say there is a level of interaction in chapter roleplays too and saying that there isn't is just completely ridiculous...

Fair enough. Saying that there is 'none' was tactical exaggeration on my part, though I've had a certain experience that came very close. I do maintain, however, that interaction (which is still the big thing that separates roleplaying from fanfiction) is horribly downplayed and restricted in chapter RPing, and bringing in the concept of 'chapters' is, to me, blurring that line which should be kept clear. I like roleplaying and I like fanfiction, but I like being able to tell the difference between them too.

I see, you've also probably been roleplaying much longer than I and have much more experience, in my experience though my longest roleplay lasted about 5 or 6 months (I think XD) and was in chapter format. I guess I have just been much more lucky with chapter format.

That could well be the case. I've had experiences of these pretty much all the way from the aforementioned two years (and a fair bit of plus I can't be bothered to count) to RPs that died within a week, so yeah, it does vary. But again, that's mostly RP master behavior and partly chance, so I'd wager it's pretty much independent of format.

Your a very aggressive arguer XD

So I've been told, yes. Massive dissection quotes of doom. I do try to be thorough about what I disagree on. ;P

(I'm sorry if I said one was better than the other.. I don't think I ever said that but meh... PS- I'm really enjoying this argument but this is starting to deviate from the subject of this section.. I know your moderator but is it cool if we clog this thread with our Argument? Would you rather continue it in PMing or do you think its relevant enough?)

Mmm...I'd say we're pretty much on topic still. This wouldn't be the first time this thread has been used for arguing matters, and we're discussing whether or not my point there is a valid 'bad habit', so I'd say we're still spot on (not to mention that seeing some healthy debate on the matter could be educational for our spectators). Don't think anyone could call us off-topic based on this.

But hey, I'm easy. Just send your responses whatever way you prefer and we'll continue down that road.

Monochrome

July 19th, 2009, 09:41 AM

It seems at this point we have both began agreeing with each other. I feel that both Free-Form (As I call them) and Chapter Roleplays have their ups and downs, it's all about preferences I guess. I'd say if your looking for a Roleplay similar to a game than Chapter Roleplaying is the way to go, if your looking to have more of an influence over the storyline of the Roleplay then Free-Form is superior. In the end it always comes down to these things. A good Roleplay Master, a good strong plot, a group of people who are intrested in what actually happens in the roleplay, and luck.

(I pretty much feel like the comments you made just then were all justified, I'm sorry if anything I said didn't make sense but once again sort of wiped right now)

GodofPH

July 19th, 2009, 09:47 AM

Roleplay fads

Back when I first got into RPing here, it was pokémorph RPs. Then it went to school RPs, skip ahead some and we have the trainer card craze which is still lurking around, an now it's generic journey and chapter format. Is it really so hard to...oh, I dunno', make an RP about something there isn't already a dozen RPs on? Playing with the cookier cutter is no way to be. u-u

This is easy to explain: If you want people to join your RP, post an RP that people will want to join. If you want to do something truly amazing and worthwhile, you can think of something revolutionary and new and possibly start a fad of your own. If you want some quick and easy SUs in your RP, go along with whatever the current fad is.

CrystallineSeraphim

July 19th, 2009, 07:34 PM

Hmmm....

Well, again, this is where the mettle of the RP master is tested. Yes, derailment can happen, but that's the point where the RP master must put their whip to good use and bring the RPers back into line. My problem with chapter format still is the rigidity. It's got this narrowly defined path like one of the GBA games where whatever 'decisions' you make have no overall impact on the storyline. Eh...tried that format out to get the first-hand experience, and I just found it stifling and frustrating, to be honest. It was like 'why am I even here? I'm not making anything happen.'.

Hmm... I seriously can't wait until they actually release a Pokemon game where your character's actions in the game actively influence the main storyline... Neverwinter Nights 2 has it down pat... but sometimes I have a hell of a hard time trying to come up with the storyline of an roleplay... I am having an abyssial time trying to work on the Roleplay of my Kingdom Hearts roleplaying guild on Gaia Online... i am trying to make a better version of a idea of Kingdom Hearts Roleplay where there is a new organization that rizes from the ashes of Organization XIII... but I am getting off topic... but it seriously getting annoying how many roleplays have a freaking evil organization with the word "Team" in their name... that is always happening in the main storyline of the Pokemon Anime... Hopefully the Pokemon: inner Spirit RP won't have that problem... I can create random acts of chaos with my NPC characters... as my character Hikaru's chaotic and slightly insane brother Makoto is a high-ranking member of the enemy organization in Inner Spirit... although they haven't appeared yet. Most of the time... it depends dramatically on whether you can come up with really good sub-plots to keep people interested... and no.. not like sidequests

liveitout

July 19th, 2009, 10:12 PM

(I had a character inable to get pregnant, and the RPer in mind got her pregnant - without even telling me. She just put it in there)

She got you character pregnant without your consent? Ouchie. Sounds like virtual rape. (Probably not what you meant, though.)

Mika

July 20th, 2009, 10:14 AM

KK SO.

[start rant]

I cannot stand it when people ditch roleplays for extended periods of time for illegitimate reasons. CANNOT STAND. Now, I'm not referring to things like surgery or real life absences as I've taken several extended leaves both planned and unplanned before. I'm simply talking about people who say they're going to be gone for a short period of time and stay away a ridiculous time after that. But, they don't stay away from PC in their abscence like a good person would. They just stay away from my roleplay.

Guys, there's NO HARM in dropping out of a roleplay if you have no time, but if you're going to go away and you decide, while you go away, that you don't want to come back, maybe, please, pretty please, tell the rp master that so he or she can move the plot along and it doesn't become backlogged? It's UNBELIEVABLY rude to keep people waiting because you're too busy posting in every other thread under the sun except for the one that's waiting on you. There's a HUGE difference between poofing off the entire site for a month and poofing off a thread for a month. >> You hold up roleplays, hell, you can KILL roleplays in doing that because people are waiting around for someone who's never going to be show up. >> -grumbles-

[/end rant]

Zeph.

September 18th, 2009, 09:14 AM

ONE LINERS!!

Ugghh... 'nuff said

namora

September 20th, 2009, 03:13 PM

I can't believe that I haven't gone in here until now, but I guess that shows how unobservant I am. *Slaps forehead* Anyway, I've got some that I don't believe, though I could easily be mistaken, haven't been discussed yet. I've obviously made up my own names for this stuff, but I didn't know any proper names for them.

Paragraphs?: I've seen a few recent examples of people who give nice, long posts, but they're only one or two paragraphs. Really long paragraphs. Theoretically, there's nothing wrong with them, but they are frankly very boring to read and even confusing. Isn't there a reason that paragraphs were invented?

When I see a huge, unbroken chunk of writing, I, shamefully, want nothing more than to skip it and go onto something else. (By the way, I love to read.) Some of them do use the Enter key, but they only press it once, so it still looks like one huge paragraph. I guess its just something that somehow, for the most part, hardwired into human beings, but I don't know. Anyway, it's good to have a new paragraph everytime the topic or person speaking changes

Double-spaced Madness: I don't know if I'm the only one who's bothered by this or not, but I've seen some people write a post similarly to the way that teachers want their papers written: double-spaced. The major difference is that there is no indentation or any other indication of where a new paragraph has been formed, so once again, It's confusing and boring.

Are we writing plays now?: HATEITHATEITHATEIT Ok, sorry I'm done. Anyway I've actually seen someone posting an RP sample like this, and worse, it was accepted. (By the way, I made this up, so I'm not pointing fingers at anyone specific):

Not exactly Shakespeare, but you get the idea. How can you tell how well someone writes from this.

He said, she said..... huh?: I've seen gripes about using said too much, which I completely agree with, but I've got something a little different in mind. It's when there's a wall of dialogue, only the first two lines or whatever actually say who's speaking. I mean, you don't have to do it everytime a character speaks, but it gets confusing if you actually have to start counting dialogues to keep track:

He said, she said..... huh?: I've seen gripes about using said too much, which I completely agree with, but I've got something a little different in mind. It's when there's a wall of dialogue, only the first two lines or whatever actually say who's speaking. I mean, you don't have to do it everytime a character speaks, but it gets confusing if you actually have to start counting dialogues to keep track:

I agre on that its very hard to keep track of it. Very much so for me as I am visually disabled to an extent and it is hard for me to keep track. i will admit I have done that on a much shorter scale such as:

"Dialogue" He said
"Dialogue" She said
"Diaolaug"
"Dialoaug"
"Dialoaug"

So it is not to hard to follow if you see my point.

Zeta Patchouli

September 20th, 2009, 06:09 PM

Well, there's only one thing that I hate...

Godmodding: THIS is my biggest pet peeve in an RP. I know it's been stated before, but even the most carefully done plot can be, not only derailed, but completely destroyed because of it.

Got a villain that's supposed to be far more powerful then the character you're fighting and needs to survive for a later plot point that is really important to the story? Well, it turns out that the RPer that has been fighting him is a Godmodder, as he writes that the opponent was beaten easily.

I hate that, and I'll give an example(This is kind of long, so please stay with me.). In a pokemon RP I ran on another forum, the players were supposed to be trapped in Oreburgh City, as the police blocked off the area, due to the Oreburgh Mine collapsing.

The sixth-generation Sinnoh Champion (The champion Cynthia had to beat to become a champion) was guarding the Oreburgh Gate as there was a suspicious character roaming around the area. Then one of the players wanted to get out through the Oreburgh Gate, and confronted the champion-level trainer.

Since I was the RP moderator who actually had a rule against Godmodding (It was a very big problem to need a rule in order to stop it.) I deleted the post, as this RPer, beat the champion easily with only one of his pokemon.

Oh, did I mention that he was a beginning trainer?

That would have killed my entire plot point for Oreburgh, as well as severly damaged the overall plot, as the main villains were using that time to take over the TV station in Jubilife, which is the third biggest plot point in the RP.

If that isn't godmodding, then I don't know what is. I usually take measures to prevent this in RPs that I make, but it is still a major pet peeve.

namora

September 21st, 2009, 05:08 AM

I agre on that its very hard to keep track of it. Very much so for me as I am visually disabled to an extent and it is hard for me to keep track. i will admit I have done that on a much shorter scale such as:

"Dialogue" He said
"Dialogue" She said
"Diaolaug"
"Dialoaug"
"Dialoaug"

So it is not to hard to follow if you see my point.

Well, that's short enough that it doesn't really bother me very much, but when people practically have to have their finger on the screen to keep track of who's speaking, there's a problem. Doesn't happen too often with me, but it does happen. Also, it would help if some action, etc., would be added in there, but that's a different subject.

Well, there's only one thing that I hate...

Godmodding: THIS is my biggest pet peeve in an RP. I know it's been stated before, but even the most carefully done plot can be, not only derailed, but completely destroyed because of it.

Got a villain that's supposed to be far more powerful then the character you're fighting and needs to survive for a later plot point that is really important to the story? Well, it turns out that the RPer that has been fighting him is a Godmodder, as he writes that the opponent was beaten easily.

I hate that, and I'll give an example(This is kind of long, so please stay with me.). In a pokemon RP I ran on another forum, the players were supposed to be trapped in Oreburgh City, as the police blocked off the area, due to the Oreburgh Mine collapsing.

The sixth-generation Sinnoh Champion (The champion Cynthia had to beat to become a champion) was guarding the Oreburgh Gate as there was a suspicious character roaming around the area. Then one of the players wanted to get out through the Oreburgh Gate, and confronted the champion-level trainer.

Since I was the RP moderator who actually had a rule against Godmodding (It was a very big problem to need a rule in order to stop it.) I deleted the post, as this RPer, beat the champion easily with only one of his pokemon.

Oh, did I mention that he was a beginning trainer?

That would have killed my entire plot point for Oreburgh, as well as severly damaged the overall plot, as the main villains were using that time to take over the TV station in Jubilife, which is the third biggest plot point in the RP.

If that isn't godmodding, then I don't know what is. I usually take measures to prevent this in RPs that I make, but it is still a major pet peeve.

Yeah, I hate it when people do that, or when you're making a point that the person you're battling is very strong, and then someone comes along and beat him with one or two moves all by him/herself, making your character look like a chump. Really irritating.

fire woven

September 21st, 2009, 01:31 PM

Well, there's only one thing that I hate...

Godmodding: THIS is my biggest pet peeve in an RP. I know it's been stated before, but even the most carefully done plot can be, not only derailed, but completely destroyed because of it.

Got a villain that's supposed to be far more powerful then the character you're fighting and needs to survive for a later plot point that is really important to the story? Well, it turns out that the RPer that has been fighting him is a Godmodder, as he writes that the opponent was beaten easily.

I hate that, and I'll give an example(This is kind of long, so please stay with me.). In a pokemon RP I ran on another forum, the players were supposed to be trapped in Oreburgh City, as the police blocked off the area, due to the Oreburgh Mine collapsing.

The sixth-generation Sinnoh Champion (The champion Cynthia had to beat to become a champion) was guarding the Oreburgh Gate as there was a suspicious character roaming around the area. Then one of the players wanted to get out through the Oreburgh Gate, and confronted the champion-level trainer.

Since I was the RP moderator who actually had a rule against Godmodding (It was a very big problem to need a rule in order to stop it.) I deleted the post, as this RPer, beat the champion easily with only one of his pokemon.

Oh, did I mention that he was a beginning trainer?

That would have killed my entire plot point for Oreburgh, as well as severly damaged the overall plot, as the main villains were using that time to take over the TV station in Jubilife, which is the third biggest plot point in the RP.

If that isn't godmodding, then I don't know what is. I usually take measures to prevent this in RPs that I make, but it is still a major pet peeve.

Yes I see your point it really takes the fun out of the RP as it can damage the plot. We are all a little more powerful in RPs then we should be but not like some people. Like in my RP we are going to Mt. Moon to stop Team Rocket. Well I'm on recon and if I come to a grunt or two me and my partener might win. If we see an admin or alot of grunts we will have to lose or it would just be pretty horrible as the time will be used for my fellow RPers to come up with teams and other plans. So yes I hate Godmoding as much as, if not more then, others. (I know I am posting a little much here but it may help my RP expirence)

God, I find it hard to break that cycle. I try and mix it up, but I feel like I leave in to many 'he/she said's'.

fire woven

September 22nd, 2009, 02:00 PM

God, I find it hard to break that cycle. I try and mix it up, but I feel like I leave in to many 'he/she said's'.

I see that point as well and yes I see what you mean. Plus randomly addding them in can make it seem like bad grammar so I try for some action. I know its pretty hard but I do want to be an author so I must learn the rules now before its way too late for me. Also some thing else about godmoding but still off topic, I remember once while on a different site, in a RP of mine some one got kicked out of a RP because he did to much godmoding but he made a new acount and did it again and he was only doing it to annoy us. And it worked he actually got kicked three more times before just spamming he then ran out of E-mail acounts and left. (we think)

Ninetales

October 11th, 2009, 03:51 AM

Chapter-based RPG's. Personally, I think chapters are a pretty good idea for an RPG--they add a nice structure to them. However, by no means am I saying that every RPG should have them. It really depends on the RP master. Some are really restrictive about what to post in the chapters, and some just don't like using the chapter system (myself included, as I like to be the type to enforce complete creative control of people's character's actions). Basically I'm reinforcing the fact that chapter-based RPG's are usually not a bad thing. I've been in RPG's on a few different sites for about five years, and to date I have never come across a chapter-based RPG I found too restrictive.

Although maybe my reason for that was because I like to defy the restrictions of the chapter sometimes. I define a chapter outline as more of a guideline on what to post. To cite an example, I'm currently in a chapter-based Pokemon RPG. The RP master has no character to play, and instead provides chapter outlines and post critiques. I find the chapter outlines to be very helpful in deciding what to post, but since my character is quite unusual (for example, he's the only nocturnal character in the RPG), I find it necessary to defy such guidelines at times. In my most recent post in that RPG, the RP master's most recent chapter outlines had each character receive things from Dr. Namba, and then travel along Route 29 (with a list of Pokemon that can be encountered). However, I had my character have his own extra chapter which followed neither of those guidelines--in fact, I had him break into Namba's house and steal some diagrams on some of his patented devices. I have yet to find out if the post was over-the-top or something, but as far as I can see, if it fits with the character's signup, it usually works.

Mary Sues. I have come across some Mary Sues in various RPGs--in fact, one time, I actually accepted a Mary-Sue signup for one of my RPG's because the creator seemed to have good RPG skills. Specifically, this was a character who was extremely thin yet angsty, came from an abusive family, and had been "tortured in her own home". Well, at least the creator wasn't that pushy or annoying, though her posts had a somewhat awkward style to them. Like I said, some RP masters are more lenient than others, and I'm possibly known for being one of the most lenient around...

Also, it is possible for someone to effectively RP a Mary-Sue/Gary-Stu character, but it is very difficult to pull off. The Trainer Kat character I mentioned in my last post in this thread is one example. Ultimately, as far as I can see it, if someone can give legitimate reasons as to why a character has a specific Mary Sue characteristic, or how that relates to their character in a fair, relatively realistic way, that is acceptable. I myself commonly use two characters who have most of the painful past characteristics of a Mary Sue, but I try to give reason to those characteristics (in one signup, I explained why the character's parents were abusive), and make sure that the character has a good balance of strengths and flaws. Of course, some characteristics can't be explained that easily--how do you explain a character with mild telempathic abilities, for example?

Speaking of the Mary Sue Litmus Test, there are some questions on that test I really don't think should be on there, like:

- "Does your character express political/religious views which you share?"
- "Do you consider the character attractive enough that you would date him/her?"
- "Does your character like the same kind of movies/music/clothing as you do?"
- "Do you wish the character were real so you could be their friend/lover?"
- "Did you pick your character's name solely because you saw it as appropriate for their characteristics?"
- "Did you give your character a certain article of clothing from your own wardrobe?"
- "Did you give your character an article of clothing you want in your wardrobe?"
- "Did you give your character their job/occupation simply because you thought it was glamourous or exciting?"

A whole bunch of these relate to the author picking a character based on things they are fond of, which is perfectly natural. I believe part of an author's bond with their characters is those characters having something the author reveres or holds closely in their hearts, things that resonate with them. Often times, the most interesting characters are the ones the author has a passion for, provided their RPing skills are sufficient. I've seen this plenty of times with my own signups. 90% of the time, the more passion I have for my character, the more likely it is to be accepted, and the more awesome the RP master and/or other players think my character is. Writing really is an expression of the author's thoughts on a subject.

And while it is true that Mary Sues can arise from the author's narcissism about their character, love of one's characters is otherwise unrelated to Mary Sue-ism--in other words, it's more of a correlation than a cause. Let me ask you this: if your RPG character asked you out on a date, would you accept? (provided they're the correct gender of course)

As far as similarity to the creator goes, this only becomes a Mary Sue factor if the creator is especially conceited or lacks self-esteem (in the case of a Goth Sue). The vast majority of authors out there insert a bit of themselves into the story, as well as some of their characters. It's just like a Pokemon, really--the Pokemon is bad only because the trainer is bad.

Also, some people have different views of what a Mary Sue is. I probably judge a character as being Mary-Sue-ish more easily than normal... in fact, I recently tested four of my most Mary-Sue suspect characters with the Mary Sue Litmus Test, and their scores were 15, 15, 18, and 24, which is relatively on the low side.

Re-Using Characters: I am a strong advocate of re-using RPG characters. Using the same character in multiple RPG's really helps with character development; in fact, the vast majority of characters in stories I'm planning to write have been in an RPG at least twice--some over five times. Plus, re-using a character gives the creator a chance to improve or re-write things, thus "polishing" the character a bit. Finally, isn't it fun to search the RPG forum and look at the different signups for one of your characters over time? (I always LOL at how different my favourite character's first RPG signup was compared to now)

However, there are some drawbacks to this. I've seen some people just copy-and-paste signups from other RPG's. This not only shows redundancy, but also lack of concern for the RPG. I frequently re-use characters, and admittedly I do copy-and-paste some of their characteristics (especially Appearance), but I modify the signup to make the character fit with the RPG (especially the History, and Pokemon if it's a Pokemon RPG). Sometimes I spontaneously add or subtract things in various fields ("Oh, let's make Yamiko wear a different shirt this time"), and sometimes I decide to re-write a field just so I'm sure I have an updated version. (Since I think about many of these characters quite often, I usually feel the need to update each time.)

Other Bad Habits I can come up with:

The TL;DR signup/post. Note that I define TL;DR as something that's long and boring. In other words, if it's not boring, a long signup/post is just fine with me. (How else was I able to read Lord of the Rings and the fifth Harry Potter book?) But occasionally there are some people who seem to favour quantity over quality, and even more annoying, say the same thing over and over again in their posts.

Then there's the issue of unnecessary detail. I generally tolerate this when I'm RP master, but I've seen several cases of "For goodness sake, will you please not write a whole novel?!?" with other RP masters. I guess the lesson learned here is that often times an RPer has to conform to the RP master's guidelines sometimes. I myself am notorious for making things long, and I've had some people say that my posts were very interesting to read, and some who asked me to shorten my posts, often in an unfriendly manner. Sometimes I end up editing a signup after posting it to take out some things. But the bottom line is that some people are really into the interesting details, whereas some have shorter attention spans and don't want to bother.

The Poke-Sue. This is a specialised Pokemon version of a Mary Sue. I have encountered many of these in Pokemon RPG's, and have found them to be as annoyingly overused as a Skarmory in competitive battling. Actually, there are two types of this:

The Game Boy Trainer: I have always loved Pokemon. When I was ten, I received a (insert name of starter Pokemon here, like Mudkip) and started my Pokemon journey. I am still kind of new to the Pokemon world, and (Pokemon) and I still have many challenges ahead of us, but hopefully that will change when (insert main conflict of RPG here) comes about!

*Some of these characters are accompanied my standard trainer sprites for their Appearance.

The Gym Leader Affiliate: I grew up under (Gym Leader)'s wing. Or, I have always loved the (Type)-type, and have studied it extensively, eventually granting me the privilege of being an apprentice in (Gym Leader)'s gym. (Gym Leader) was eventually kind enough to give me a (Pokemon that matches Type) so that I could start my own Pokemon journey. Because I was (Unique Characteristic), I caught (This Many) Pokemon, and have been quite successful on my journey so far. I think (Gym Leader) must be proud of me. However, (Flaw) and (RPG conflict) are really setting me back...

*Note: Some of these characteristics are necessary for certain RPG's--for example, one I'm in requires the characters to be Gym Leader apprentices.

The Mega Champion

October 11th, 2009, 09:43 AM

Re-Using Characters: I am a strong advocate of re-using RPG characters. Using the same character in multiple RPG's really helps with character development; in fact, the vast majority of characters in stories I'm planning to write have been in an RPG at least twice--some over five times. Plus, re-using a character gives the creator a chance to improve or re-write things, thus "polishing" the character a bit. Finally, isn't it fun to search the RPG forum and look at the different signups for one of your characters over time? (I always LOL at how different my favourite character's first RPG signup was compared to now)

However, there are some drawbacks to this. I've seen some people just copy-and-paste signups from other RPG's. This not only shows redundancy, but also lack of concern for the RPG. I frequently re-use characters, and admittedly I do copy-and-paste some of their characteristics (especially Appearance), but I modify the signup to make the character fit with the RPG (especially the History, and Pokemon if it's a Pokemon RPG). Sometimes I spontaneously add or subtract things in various fields ("Oh, let's make Yamiko wear a different shirt this time"), and sometimes I decide to re-write a field just so I'm sure I have an updated version. (Since I think about many of these characters quite often, I usually feel the need to update each time.)

I agree.

Especially for me. I get tired of having to make new characters every time I want to apply for a new Pokemon RP.

Besides, I haven't been able to use MOST of my RP characters to their full potential.

Why?

Because pretty much ALL of the Pokemon RP's I've been involved in have been force canceled or were never completed before the RP's true "end."

WTF?!

What is this?! Some kind of jinx on me?!

Ugh...

X_X;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;

Deoxys55

October 20th, 2009, 05:18 PM

I actually haven't RPed on this particular forum for quite a while, but... xD Here are two that always bug me:

The Copypasta SU.
This doesn't have anything to do with actual RPing ability, but it still annoys me to no end. It's when people take the sign-up sheet that puts additional explaination within:

And copy-paste it and then JUST START WRITING OVER IT without deleting the info! Like this:

Name: (First and Last) Rebecca Odwin
Age: (Must be older than 12) 14
Personality: (Complete sentences please) Rebecca is very shy. She doesn't talk with people very often. She's really nice, but she gets attached too easily.
History: (Must include first pokemon) She grew up in Kanto where she lived with her dad. He bought her a Pikachu for her birthday.

Aside from the SU sucking, you see what I mean? How hard is it to delete the three or four words that have nothing to do with your SU? D8<

/neurotic rant over

The Five Paragraph Requirement.
This is a fault of the RP master. Look, I love literacy. I love description. I don't like seeing crappy one-liners in my RPs. But, sweet Jeebus, do you have to REQUIRE 4-5 paragraphs to even post in the RP!? 1 or 2 I can understand, 3 tops, but 4-5 is an essay. It's not too hard to stretch out "He walked into the room" into a good-sized paragraph, but it's simply impossible to make a long-term RP that requires you to do that for several paragraphs in every post.

I'm done. :X

Dragon Song

November 1st, 2009, 06:26 AM

God, I find it hard to break that cycle. I try and mix it up, but I feel like I leave in to many 'he/she said's'.

Honestly, I can never justify (for me, I don't know about the rest of you) just dialouge in a post without my character's name at the beginning because I lose track of who's talking. I read a short story one time, and at one point there were ten straight lines of
"Dialouge" said she
with two girl's arguing. Even with usernames at the top I can't keep track of that!

Vespinus

November 1st, 2009, 09:02 AM

Although I'm not an experienced roleplayer, I must say. I can't abide abide bad grammar or spelling, it's ok if it's an accident, but when it's just because you're lazy... This is a post I can remember from another forum I was on.

" JAmie was Walking in th wood and he was vry happy. he had justcaught a caterpie and he wanted to evolve it in2 a butter3."
And another 2 paragraphs of that. But the worst post I have ever seen was from an RP master on a forum associated with some online browser game called Travian. To clear up any confusion, the others were me and the other RPers.

" 'omg, thats like so crappy dude!' the champ was standing in front of adam and the others. 'im gonna take u down and then im gonna take out the others. They won't be safe from me ever mwahaha!' michael throo a pokeball and a arceus came out. 'arceus use judgment!' michael yelled. arceus rored and throo a ball of lite at the champ and th eothers and it sent the champ flying. 'no, please michael ill do anything u want please just don't hurt me' the champ said. i laughed and kiked him and he cried out in pain. 'now im angry i'm gonna kill you all arceus kill them all' michael said arceus killed all them all because they were so weak but he brought them back 2 life. 'because i am the greatest i will let u serve me if you dont serve me i will kill u.' the others all agreed and michael ruled the world.

You see? And where the HELL did that Arceus come from!? He said on his SU "Pokemon: Charmander". And that was the 9th post. basically, we had all posted, then he posted, and then someone else posted, and he posted that monstrosity. Okay, I'm done being angry.

just plz remembr 2 yoos gud spelling and grammur ty.
XD

Musician of Literature

November 11th, 2009, 05:47 PM

Mary Sues. I have come across some Mary Sues in various RPGs--in fact, one time, I actually accepted a Mary-Sue signup for one of my RPG's because the creator seemed to have good RPG skills. Specifically, this was a character who was extremely thin yet angsty, came from an abusive family, and had been "tortured in her own home". Well, at least the creator wasn't that pushy or annoying, though her posts had a somewhat awkward style to them. Like I said, some RP masters are more lenient than others, and I'm possibly known for being one of the most lenient around...

I am also very lenient, probably because I have very little experience, but I know a Gary-Stu when I see one. I've had that problem before. Let's go back to an old memory. A school RP. Juu-Chan...

Yeah, I was creating a character called Adrastos Stephen Diodorus. And it turned out to be a Gary-Stu. Yeah, then I argued needlessly. Well, now I'm seeing my mistakes...

Also, it is possible for someone to effectively RP a Mary-Sue/Gary-Stu character, but it is very difficult to pull off. The Trainer Kat character I mentioned in my last post in this thread is one example. Ultimately, as far as I can see it, if someone can give legitimate reasons as to why a character has a specific Mary Sue characteristic, or how that relates to their character in a fair, relatively realistic way, that is acceptable. I myself commonly use two characters who have most of the painful past characteristics of a Mary Sue, but I try to give reason to those characteristics (in one signup, I explained why the character's parents were abusive), and make sure that the character has a good balance of strengths and flaws. Of course, some characteristics can't be explained that easily--how do you explain a character with mild telempathic abilities, for example?

Speaking of the Mary Sue Litmus Test, there are some questions on that test I really don't think should be on there, like:

- "Does your character express political/religious views which you share?"

I'm pretty sure that there is no religion in the Pokemon world.
"Do you consider the character attractive enough that you would date him/her?"

Uh, yeah, I'm not even allowed yet...
- "Does your character like the same kind of movies/music/clothing as you do?"]

Yeah, their likes don't determine Gary-Stuness.
- "Do you wish the character were real so you could be their friend/lover?"

I actually think that is a good question.
"Did you pick your character's name solely because you saw it as appropriate for their characteristics?"

I don't see anything wrong with doing that. I do it sometimes.

- "Did you give your character a certain article of clothing from your own wardrobe?"

- "Did you give your character an article of clothing you want in your wardrobe?"

First question, I see nothing wrong with it. The Second one, I think it is necessary.
- "Did you give your character their job/occupation simply because you thought it was glamourous or exciting?"

Agree with you for that one.

A whole bunch of these relate to the author picking a character based on things they are fond of, which is perfectly natural. I believe part of an author's bond with their characters is those characters having something the author reveres or holds closely in their hearts, things that resonate with them. Often times, the most interesting characters are the ones the author has a passion for, provided their RPing skills are sufficient. I've seen this plenty of times with my own signups. 90% of the time, the more passion I have for my character, the more likely it is to be accepted, and the more awesome the RP master and/or other players think my character is. Writing really is an expression of the author's thoughts on a subject.

Very well put.

And while it is true that Mary Sues can arise from the author's narcissism about their character, love of one's characters is otherwise unrelated to Mary Sue-ism--in other words, it's more of a correlation than a cause. Let me ask you this: if your RPG character asked you out on a date, would you accept? (provided they're the correct gender of course)

How would a character that is not real ask me on a date? And, again, I'm too young...

Also, some people have different views of what a Mary Sue is. I probably judge a character as being Mary-Sue-ish more easily than normal... in fact, I recently tested four of my most Mary-Sue suspect characters with the Mary Sue Litmus Test, and their scores were 15, 15, 18, and 24, which is relatively on the low side.

Good post. Em, what is The Mary Sue Litmus Test?

Dragon Song

November 12th, 2009, 08:02 AM

Lines:
As far as the four-line or one-line argument...the length of a line on this forum in the actual final product of your post varies incredibly depending on the forum. I know some forums where the post stretches all across the screen, and others where your posts take up less than half of the screen space. A 'line' length also depends on the size of the monitor it's being viewed on. Despite the fact that I agree to quality > quantity, it's incredibly difficult to condense a paragraph into a sentence, and any post should have several sentences.

Mary-Sues:
While Mary-Sues are in general frowned upon, and should be, I believe that all characters should have a few Mary-Sue characteristics. Real people nearly always have at least a few Mary-Sue characteristics. Or, at least, so far as I know.

The Enter Key:
Especially in a very, very long post I don't think there should be any blocks of text with more than ten sentences in them, because there must be a place to end a paragraph somewhere in there!! And if you press the enter key in a post, a good rule of thumb in my opinion is to press it twice. Then I can see where one paragraph stops and the next one starts. ^_^

Mid-post smilies:
annoy me to no end. This post drove me up a wall: (stuff is changed. I did it on purpose)

The website also had this blue smilie that he put after the word ice every time.
Don't do that. ; )

Decorative posts:
I've only really seen these on other websites but it is important.
The people who use a HUGE picture for their character, include it in every post, and use colorful text (a different color for each of their five characters!!) have a serious problem. Most of them don't even write a full sentence, either.

You're:
is a contraction form of You Are. If all else fails, just write out you are and leave my mental grammatical correction system in peace. Your (no 'e'!) shows possessive. For example, "Hi Joey, is this your pencil?" You're would happy more like this: "You're not busy, are you?"

To:
It's somehow even more annoying than you're. An example of the word 'to' in context "I would be happy to write a letter" next we have the word 'too': "We have too many cupcakes!" and finally 'two': "There are two fish sticks on the plate."

Roxasabridged

December 18th, 2009, 01:05 PM

Over leniency - Basically allowing things to happen even if they shouldn't. Like say... not correcting a mistake that effects the outcome/plot/whatever of your RP.
Too much posting - Basically replying to posts with new actions before other RP'ers get a say, basically forcing someone to make a post of how your character stood around doing nothing until this or that happened.
Grammar - While I haven't come across 1337 posts or anything, I've seen plenty of sentences butchered by bad spelling and punctuation. Also, reffering to your character as 'I' gets confusing. At least for me.

ArcanineOod

January 1st, 2010, 04:44 PM

There isn't really much I can add to this thread, though I can expand on the grammar issue.
It peeves me when people change tense in the middle of their posts. I don't suppose I'm wrong in saying that it's best to use the past tense in an RP. Some RPers, however, start using the present tense in their posts, and it's so dang annoying! I mean, if that's their style... But they mix past and present in their posts and it gets difficult to understand what they're saying, y'know?

I know I've been guilty of creating a Mary Sue character; a girl whose childhood was good but for the fact she always suspected her parents didn't love each other. She put off going on her Pokemon journey because she knew that once she left home her parents would split up because they were only staying together for her sake. Soon after she did leave, they split up, and she was never the same again. She became an angry, angsty loner who didn't want to talk to anyone ever again, not ever her starter Pokemon, Zubat.
That RP didn't even get off the ground, luckily. I wrote the introductory post about how the cruise ship crashed and she wound up as a Sneasel on a tropical island, but the RP master never posted theirs and the RP never even started. Meh.

Do you lot get peeved by odd sounding names? For example, the character I just described was called 'Arcadia'. I beautiful sounding name, in my opinion, but I wouldn't say it was appropriate. Not a very realistic name, either. Better to stick with normal sounding names?
I mean, if you're RPing some magical creature or a person from a mystical clan, or whatever, then it's fine, but for a regular old human? Not the wisest choice.

Reading back over the stuff on this page, I totally agree with Ninetales in that it's perfectly alright, and probably wise, to create a character with similar interests to yours. After all, if you're interested in something, you'll find it easier to talk about and therefore easier to convince the other RPers that your character's really into it. It makes for a more convincing and better played character, and that's certainly not a bad thing, surely?

Roxasabridged, I think I'm guilty of too much posting. I'm so eager to continue RPing that I can sometimes jump in and reply too quickly. However, this might be because (in the RP I'm currently in, anyway) I'm in a quite different timezone to the other RPers. I wake up in the morning and find that everyone's posted and left, so after I post I wait around all day and because I'm so bored of waiting, I jump in and post as soon as I can. It's silly, but true, unfortunately.

xX

Zeph.

January 1st, 2010, 08:54 PM

There is one thing I've noticed in Chapter format RPs. I haven't been guilty of it myself, it's just what I've noticed.

Sneakily 'getting' pokemon. The proper way most RPs run is that you throw a pokeball and hope the GM lets you catch it. There's always one who 'befriends' a pokemon and earns its trust - resulting in it joining the team. It's plain sneaky, as the GM can't really avoid that.

Just a little peev of mine. It's late, I'm tired. Go figure :)

Frostbiteकर्म

January 1st, 2010, 09:27 PM

I have to really agree with you on that one, Zeph. >>; It's especially annoying when they try to get the Pokemon and other things out of the post.

WeissRaben

March 29th, 2010, 06:11 AM

*blows dust away*

...so, then. Bad habits...well it depends. It depends from the beholder's formation, mainly - I came up (as an RPer) with the Italian School, which has a completely different set of habits and bad habits, and the first time I saw an RP (compared to the italian PbF, Play by Forum) I was...little less than shocked. In Italy, bunnying (or "autoconcluding") can get you BANNED if recidive, just to quote an example. Here is accepted, with different degrees of tolerance, but I saw but a couple of threads with the "No bunnying" rule. All in all, it varies.

Of course, God Modes and Mary Sues are quite universally recognized as the bane of RPing. 8D

Loki

March 29th, 2010, 08:11 AM

*blows dust away*

...so, then. Bad habits...well it depends. It depends from the beholder's formation, mainly - I came up (as an RPer) with the Italian School, which has a completely different set of habits and bad habits, and the first time I saw an RP (compared to the italian PbF, Play by Forum) I was...little less than shocked. In Italy, bunnying (or "autoconcluding") can get you BANNED if recidive, just to quote an example. Here is accepted, with different degrees of tolerance, but I saw but a couple of threads with the "No bunnying" rule. All in all, it varies.

Of course, God Modes and Mary Sues are quite universally recognized as the bane of RPing. 8D

For me, it's sometimes difficult to get things done in an adequate 2000 word+ post without doing at least a little bunnying. But usually the thing is, if the other RP'er really has a big issue with what I did with their character, it's not like I'm going to bend over backwards if I have to edit a little, y'know? xD I definitely agree that it varies- since I remember the days when even the slightest bit of bunnying here was a sign to get you n00b-gutted. But for me- I'm definitely guilty now.

Anyway, it's been awhile since I RP'd on PC, but I'm sure some of these you guys can relate.
Hopefully I'm not reiterating something we've said before, but the old posts were just so long ago.

Spotlight Lover: Have you ever met someone who just would not shut up about their character, and how cute and amazing and fun their character is? Okay, you may think I'm exaggerating, but I'm not. When people turn perfectly fine, perfectly flawed characters into Mary-Sue's just by talking about all their good qualities and what-not. That's like getting your first boyfriend/girlfriend and then never shutting up about them- which is just as bad. God when people freaking fall in love with their character it has got to be the most obnoxious thing. Especially when they can't tell that there are at least fifty million things WRONG with their character, and then they get all defensive or offended if you try to be like, "Er, no, actually your character isn't all that great. Stfu?" So usually this winds up with them unconciously trying to cast the entire roleplay's attention onto that particular character, and whenever something is brought up, they HAVE to include that person. Set the chara aside, and calm down. Jeez!

Feign

March 29th, 2010, 08:20 AM

Loki, that happens enough as it is with Twilight fans... ;_; XD

Of course there are those posts where turns have to be taken between two RPers, so not a lot of words could be written, which at times kind of sucks, but in other ways can be solved too. XD

Like for example a battle, could be written in two parts, by both battlers, and the RP OP could determine the winner, and the winner posts the winning move.

I've seen plenty of run on sentences though... A lot of the "and then..." replaces periods.

Zeph.

March 29th, 2010, 09:01 AM

At the risk of sounding pompous: bad grammar annoys me.

Things like:

Harry woke up that morning and stared at the sky.Hed always dreamed of being a pokemon trainer and this was finally the day.He went downstairs and said,"goodbye mum and dad" before leaving... etc

Also, why do so many people come up with Japanese names? Things like Nakamura, Shinto, Suzuke and so on...

Feign

March 29th, 2010, 09:06 AM

Probably because Pokemon is Japanese, and people feel the need to emulate that? XD

I tend to use names with Latin derivatives... at least it is something I know...

But I have seen those fics are RPs where people say they are Japanese or something like that, but get everything else wrong... It's kind of hard to write about a whole new culture liek that...

WeissRaben

March 29th, 2010, 09:08 AM

Loki, that happens enough as it is with Twilight fans... ;_; XD

Of course there are those posts where turns have to be taken between two RPers, so not a lot of words could be written, which at times kind of sucks, but in other ways can be solved too. XD

Like for example a battle, could be written in two parts, by both battlers, and the RP OP could determine the winner, and the winner posts the winning move.

I've seen plenty of run on sentences though... A lot of the "and then..." replaces periods.

Italians are MASTERS of the conditionals. XD Battles are done by describing, post after post, moves and not their effects: the enemy describes the effects and then his moves. Rince and repeat.
Of course, this makes honesty one of the staples of RP, and repeated use of the Invulnerability Cheat leads to the same effects as autoconcluding, so there is a nice balance. :3

Aaaaand...well, don't you hate the Downgrading? I know, maybe saying that I'm very, very fast in combat is a little Sue-ish (but, unless the chara isn't good at EVERYTHING, it can be); but well, then there are the ones who MUST peak you. "Ah, you're too slow". And then RAEG starts.

Loki

March 29th, 2010, 09:14 AM

Feign: Ah, well here posts go a lot faster, so having battles like that is plausible. xD; Posts where I RP at take weeks to appear, so "taking turns" is...

tedious. =w=

And Twilight fans. I think that's a perfect description of it. xD;

And for battles I've always just written those with whoever I'm battling, and then one of us posts it. We usually decide amongst ourselves who won and who lost, but I dunno if writing one post together was what you meant by writing two parts?

*makes this on-topic* Really big quote from Ninetales down here. Just so that you guys don't have to scroll. xD

Mary Sues. I have come across some Mary Sues in various RPGs--in fact, one time, I actually accepted a Mary-Sue signup for one of my RPG's because the creator seemed to have good RPG skills. Specifically, this was a character who was extremely thin yet angsty, came from an abusive family, and had been "tortured in her own home". Well, at least the creator wasn't that pushy or annoying, though her posts had a somewhat awkward style to them. Like I said, some RP masters are more lenient than others, and I'm possibly known for being one of the most lenient around...

Also, it is possible for someone to effectively RP a Mary-Sue/Gary-Stu character, but it is very difficult to pull off. The Trainer Kat character I mentioned in my last post in this thread is one example. Ultimately, as far as I can see it, if someone can give legitimate reasons as to why a character has a specific Mary Sue characteristic, or how that relates to their character in a fair, relatively realistic way, that is acceptable. I myself commonly use two characters who have most of the painful past characteristics of a Mary Sue, but I try to give reason to those characteristics (in one signup, I explained why the character's parents were abusive), and make sure that the character has a good balance of strengths and flaws. Of course, some characteristics can't be explained that easily--how do you explain a character with mild telempathic abilities, for example?

Speaking of the Mary Sue Litmus Test, there are some questions on that test I really don't think should be on there, like:

- "Does your character express political/religious views which you share?"
- "Do you consider the character attractive enough that you would date him/her?"
- "Does your character like the same kind of movies/music/clothing as you do?"
- "Do you wish the character were real so you could be their friend/lover?"
- "Did you pick your character's name solely because you saw it as appropriate for their characteristics?"
- "Did you give your character a certain article of clothing from your own wardrobe?"
- "Did you give your character an article of clothing you want in your wardrobe?"
- "Did you give your character their job/occupation simply because you thought it was glamourous or exciting?"

A whole bunch of these relate to the author picking a character based on things they are fond of, which is perfectly natural. I believe part of an author's bond with their characters is those characters having something the author reveres or holds closely in their hearts, things that resonate with them. Often times, the most interesting characters are the ones the author has a passion for, provided their RPing skills are sufficient. I've seen this plenty of times with my own signups. 90% of the time, the more passion I have for my character, the more likely it is to be accepted, and the more awesome the RP master and/or other players think my character is. Writing really is an expression of the author's thoughts on a subject.

And while it is true that Mary Sues can arise from the author's narcissism about their character, love of one's characters is otherwise unrelated to Mary Sue-ism--in other words, it's more of a correlation than a cause. Let me ask you this: if your RPG character asked you out on a date, would you accept? (provided they're the correct gender of course)

As far as similarity to the creator goes, this only becomes a Mary Sue factor if the creator is especially conceited or lacks self-esteem (in the case of a Goth Sue). The vast majority of authors out there insert a bit of themselves into the story, as well as some of their characters. It's just like a Pokemon, really--the Pokemon is bad only because the trainer is bad.

Re-Using Characters: I am a strong advocate of re-using RPG characters. Using the same character in multiple RPG's really helps with character development; in fact, the vast majority of characters in stories I'm planning to write have been in an RPG at least twice--some over five times. Plus, re-using a character gives the creator a chance to improve or re-write things, thus "polishing" the character a bit. Finally, isn't it fun to search the RPG forum and look at the different signups for one of your characters over time? (I always LOL at how different my favourite character's first RPG signup was compared to now)

However, there are some drawbacks to this. I've seen some people just copy-and-paste signups from other RPG's. This not only shows redundancy, but also lack of concern for the RPG. I frequently re-use characters, and admittedly I do copy-and-paste some of their characteristics (especially Appearance), but I modify the signup to make the character fit with the RPG (especially the History, and Pokemon if it's a Pokemon RPG). Sometimes I spontaneously add or subtract things in various fields ("Oh, let's make Yamiko wear a different shirt this time"), and sometimes I decide to re-write a field just so I'm sure I have an updated version. (Since I think about many of these characters quite often, I usually feel the need to update each time.)

Other Bad Habits I can come up with:

The TL;DR signup/post. Note that I define TL;DR as something that's long and boring. In other words, if it's not boring, a long signup/post is just fine with me. (How else was I able to read Lord of the Rings and the fifth Harry Potter book?) But occasionally there are some people who seem to favour quantity over quality, and even more annoying, say the same thing over and over again in their posts.

Then there's the issue of unnecessary detail. I generally tolerate this when I'm RP master, but I've seen several cases of "For goodness sake, will you please not write a whole novel?!?" with other RP masters. I guess the lesson learned here is that often times an RPer has to conform to the RP master's guidelines sometimes. I myself am notorious for making things long, and I've had some people say that my posts were very interesting to read, and some who asked me to shorten my posts, often in an unfriendly manner. Sometimes I end up editing a signup after posting it to take out some things. But the bottom line is that some people are really into the interesting details, whereas some have shorter attention spans and don't want to bother.

The Gym Leader Affiliate: I grew up under (Gym Leader)'s wing. Or, I have always loved the (Type)-type, and have studied it extensively, eventually granting me the privilege of being an apprentice in (Gym Leader)'s gym. (Gym Leader) was eventually kind enough to give me a (Pokemon that matches Type) so that I could start my own Pokemon journey. Because I was (Unique Characteristic), I caught (This Many) Pokemon, and have been quite successful on my journey so far. I think (Gym Leader) must be proud of me. However, (Flaw) and (RPG conflict) are really setting me back...

*Note: Some of these characteristics are necessary for certain RPG's--for example, one I'm in requires the characters to be Gym Leader apprentices.

Hahaha, I love how long your post is Ninetales. I see you haven’t changed at all. xD
Anyway about the Mary-Sue Litmus, I think that entire test should be taken with a grain of salt. To me, a perfectly good character can be ruined by a dumb RPer, and a character that wasn’t mary-sue can become mary-sue. It’s all in the way you play the character, and that test focuses more on how you created them.

What the Litmus test doesn’t take into account is that nobody wants to play a morbidly obese, acne riddled, social failure. That’s not what roleplaying is about- roleplaying is about being in a different world where you can be someone else. (Which is why I laugh when people use themselves as their character. If you want to be the hero of a story, go wave a hockey stick around in your driveway and use your imagination there.) Of course, this is my own personal opinion, but while the Litmus test is fun, I usually score pretty high on that baby. And unless people aren’t telling me something, I’ve never had much of an issue with mary-sues. Lately anyway- when I look back on my old posts I just… facepalm. But yeah. It’s not how you make the character; It’s how you portray them, to me. (Like your example of Trainer Kat- though I personally don’t remember her making such a terrible idea of a character.)

For awhile, Re-using characters was a huge taboo for me, but now, I definitely agree. It helps you understand the character’s thought process better- and for me, I usually just re-use characters that never got to see IC action. Because I usually just don’t have enough imagination or organizational skills to have two of the same characters in two different RP settings without getting extremely confused. xD

TL;DR anything: Guilty, guilty, especially as of late. (Though some people seem to think that posts I think are boring are interesting. If that sentence made any sense at all.) I do think though, that when you’re posting, you should really conform to what other people are doing even just out of politeness. If they’re only posting three paragraphs, that means they only want to read three paragraphs. If they’re posting five+, that means they want to read 5+. If they’re posting one, then that’s a sign to steer clear, hahahaha. Just kidding, but yeah, following the original pattern; One paragraph posted = One paragraph of another post read. You need to sort of adjust your length to suit others’ preferences- and that was why I’ve asked you to shorten your posts in the past, Ninetales. xD; Sorry if I wasn’t too nice about it. It’s actually one of my pet peeves when people post super long posts when I don’t- I’m usually just not in the mood to read it all the way through, and that’s unfair to the RP’er, since they spend all that time typing. Though we probably just have different ideas of what’s interesting- haven’t RP’ed with you for awhile, so maybe that’s changed. ;D

Oh god apprentices in roleplays that don’t call for them. I think we should just burn them all off the face of the planet. Personally, I think that’s a form of minor god-modding. It’s an unfair advantage, and it’s… dumb. ESPECIALLY if it’s a canon gym leader. But I personally hate any sort of canon – original character mixing, no matter how you twist it. AU for me. xD

Aw you guys posted a bunch while I was typing my response to her. xD

Anyway I hate it when people try to use Japanese names when they don't know anything about Japan. I'm so guilty of this back during my n00b days though. But I definitely think that it's just a phase people go through, and at some point, they smarten up or just stop RP'ing altogether. That's the trend I see anyway.

Zeph- actually your example brings up another peeve of mine. When people don't connect the events in their post. It's like, I don't want a laundry list of what your character did, kk? xDD I hate it when people do that. It was a huge trend here when I left this section- I hope it's changed for the better. xD;

Weiss- are you saying that you don't like it when you state a fact about your character and then someone disregards it? xD
Like, if you said your character was very very fast- and I said "too bad lol mai chara iz fastur"? xD; [/not sure I'm understanding your point]

Feign

March 29th, 2010, 09:16 AM

Italians are MASTERS of the conditionals. XD Battles are done by describing, post after post, moves and not their effects: the enemy describes the effects and then his moves. Rince and repeat.
Of course, this makes honesty one of the staples of RP, and repeated use of the Invulnerability Cheat leads to the same effects as autoconcluding, so there is a nice balance. :3

Aaaaand...well, don't you hate the Downgrading? I know, maybe saying that I'm very, very fast in combat is a little Sue-ish (but, unless the chara isn't good at EVERYTHING, it can be); but well, then there are the ones who MUST peak you. "Ah, you're too slow". And then RAEG starts.

Yeah I did do that style (reacion style) for a Stargate RP, but I believe the people there were more active, so it works better that way.

But yeah, I know what you mean... People start to cheat too much, if they don't know what they are doing, or tend to bend the laws of physics or something stupid...

Lol... if I ended up in that situation, I'd usually best that person, assuming that the person is honesty, and abides by the rules, otherwise, they'd just complain, even though they are at fault even if they don't know it yet.

WeissRaben

March 29th, 2010, 09:34 AM

"too bad lol mai chara iz fastur" indeed, Loki - a good character has to have a peak, a quality that makes him different from the others. Disregarding this means the character is basically useless, or -even worse- average. Because PCs are NOT average, which is what makes them different from the Commoner Peasant lv 1. XD

And, the reaction style (both in battle and out) works very well, and it allows (alongside decided results, if wanted) battles where you DO NOT know who will win, and who will best who in tactics and such. Because, if the other employed a semi-flawless tactics, he did not autoconcluded, but he forces you to take the blow...if you do not have a SMARTER tactic, that's it. 8D

- Some people, when fighting, say "Erik fought the Pidgey, won and moved on" That sort of defeats the purpose of battling, and ruins the moment....and sort of lazy, like that person didn't want to type in the fight.

- Another thing is when RPERS bunny other RPERS, and make a romance with them. It's distasteful and just plain wrong.

I'll post more when I see more bad RPERS.

Rabbit

March 29th, 2010, 09:37 PM

I'll post more when I see more bad RPERS.

You don't have to look far. -twitch-

One of my biggest pet peeves is unrealistic character basics. Like bizarre names that don't correspond with any Earth culture. What, did your character come through a portal to Middle Earth? Or purple hair. No explanation. Is it dyed? Or does your character just defy genetics? I know this is Pokemon, thus not pure reality, but let's try to keep the fantasy to a minimum before things get out of hand and I decide to give my character a dragon steed.

Another big one that keeps coming up...BASIC GRAMMAR. Come on, people. There are guides all over the freaking place. And all of them tell you to use good grammar. Is it that difficult for you? Did you struggle in grade 5 and fail to catch up? It's just showing courtesy to other roleplayers. Run-on sentences, poor spelling, and misuse of quotes make me seriously consider murdering your character.

I think grammar has been left up to the GM. Some are okay with it, however others warn the RPer in hand to improve on spelling and full stops etc.

But yeah, grammar shouldn't be too hard. It's the kind of thing you learn when you're 9 or 10 years old.

Loki

March 30th, 2010, 12:15 PM

You don't have to look far. -twitch-

ROFL my sentiments in six words and a contraction.

As for unrealistic character traits and names, in Pokemon roleplays I don't mind as much. Harley had purple hair and dressed like a Cacturne. Like woah what. But in other kinds of roleplays, especially slice-of-life or school-based roleplays, it peeves me too.

Rabbit

March 30th, 2010, 11:40 PM

Here's another one:

When a roleplayer chooses to ignore the other characters. Especially when the roleplay's plot is group-based and you're supposed to, like, I dunno, cooperate with each other? But no, you decide to give your character all of the action, cramming your post full of epic feats and adventures without any regard for what anyone else is doing. Or can't do, now that you've done it for them.

pokemongarnet

April 24th, 2010, 12:28 PM

One of my biggest pet peeves is unrealistic character basics. Like bizarre names that don't correspond with any Earth culture. What, did your character come through a portal to Middle Earth? Or purple hair. No explanation. Is it dyed? Or does your character just defy genetics? I know this is Pokemon, thus not pure reality, but let's try to keep the fantasy to a minimum before things get out of hand and I decide to give my character a dragon steed.

Even though it's been nearly a month since someones posted on this, I really don't mind the purple hair idea because it's pokemon. But yeah I'm not a big fan of when a, supposed to be regular, trainer has super powers

Neo Pikachu

April 24th, 2010, 01:08 PM

Well, here are two of my peeves that I've noticed on sign ups.

Child prodigy characters - Can't stand them and they're everywhere. So many times I've seen people make characters with backgrounds that they've always been ultra smart, and end up being extremely professional scientists, engineers, and the like and yet only be 13-15 years old. There's no way this would ever happen, and cases of child genius are extremely rare in real life.

Loads of shiny Pokemon - I mean come on, they're not supposed to be that common. Having one every now and then doesn't hurt, but I can't help but roll my eyes when I see people having three or four of them. Without a doubt, shiny Pokemon are probably the most overhyped thing about the entire fandom. Plus in my opinion, 9 times out of 10 the alternate coloring doesn't look good at all.

Macaroni

April 24th, 2010, 06:10 PM

An entire thread? Just to complain? YES.

Hello! I'm shy except not really. - Not shy characters in general. Those can be done very well. I mean when the sign-ups say they're shy, but they don't act that way at all in the roleplay. Most of the time it's put there as a sole 'fault', and is followed by something along the lines of 'but when you get to know him, he is super cool and awesome and will do anything for you!' Plus, shyness isn't really a fault. There's advantages and disadvantages to both introversion and extraversion.

There are no side effects to being neglected other than ANGST - I don't mind characters who were abused by their characters, or orphaned on the streets, or have a mental disorder, I really don't. Just make sure to prove it, rather than just having the characters go "B'AAAAW AS A CHILD MY DAD BEAT ME THEN KICKED ME OUT". If they're living on the streets and are malnourished, it's going to have an effect. If it goes on long enough, certain vitamin shortages can lead to effects such as stunted growth and being blind. Just do some research on what effects it'd have, it only takes a quick google search.

We're so dumb, slavery is okay to us! - Hello, one day you were walking around when a nice dominant species went by and caught you. You now get to participate in **** battles! For some reason, you have no problem with this.

But seriously, this has been something that's been bugging me for ages. No, I'm not saying that every pokemon has to secretly hate the trainer. If they've been raised from an egg, captured young, want a trainer to help then grow stronger, and a thousand other scenarios, they could actually appreciate being captured. However, not every pokemon will automatically accept the fact that they're being taken away from their families, their environment, and life as they know it, especially if they're a strong and experienced pokemon. Even one that refuses to follow the trainer's orders and battles in it's own way instead would be good. Just anything instead of 'MY TRAINER IS THE BEST EVER DESU.'

LOOK AT MY DAZZLING BLUE EYES - This doesn't bug me, but it's just slowly started to creep me out over the years. Most characters have electric/dazzling/sapphire/-insert prose here- blue eyes. Tons of characters are slightly chubby or muscular, but never completely obese or a complete meathead. I understand, it's fun to play some attractive, socially capable character. It's even more fun to play a character who has major flaws. I know this from experience. lD

Izanagi

April 24th, 2010, 06:22 PM

I'm a Legendary Trainer!
I hate it when people RP as characters who've competed and most likely won the Indigo Conference, the Silver Conference, the Ever Grande Conference, the Sinnoh Conference, the Orange Conference, the Battle Frontier, and on, and on. Characters who have conquered every challenge and are the epitome of awesome. Usually topped off with an uber team usually including Dragonite, Salamence, some Eeveelution, and a shiny or two.

Shen

April 25th, 2010, 02:39 AM

No doubt has been mentioned many times before, but seriously, people being able to talk in fluent english to their Pokemon. It just takes my willing suspension of disbelief and throws it out the airlock. Yes Pokemon are incredibly intelligent beings, but they're still animals. They're not humans. Human-level intellect is a rare thing among Pokemon and only some species have it, such as Slowking, Lapras and some legendaries. It's rather unethical to capture and enslave those ones, considering they are most certainly sentient, but then you're saying that all Pokemon are? The first thing I think when I see a character like that is "wow, that character must be a real git. He/She KNOWS that they are sentient, yet they force them under their control anyway. Hating now." There is a lot wrong with the Pokemon world when you look at it from an objective angle already, no need to make it worse.
And that's not even touching on the blatant Sue-ism of it all.
But what really ticks me off about it is the fact that it defeats the whole purpose of a group roleplay. You're supposed to be interacting with other characters i.e other people i.e not yourself. Write a fanfiction for that.

Velvex the Øverlørd

April 26th, 2010, 10:48 PM

Well, I just read this thread for the first time, and I couldn't agree more with what the starting post stated. Especially that little bit about cliche RPers. We're almost all guilty of creating a cliche character, yet we resent cliche-ness (Adding "-ness" to the end of words FTW!) oh so much.

Mika

April 27th, 2010, 10:37 AM

No doubt has been mentioned many times before, but seriously, people being able to talk in fluent english to their Pokemon. It just takes my willing suspension of disbelief and throws it out the airlock. Yes Pokemon are incredibly intelligent beings, but they're still animals. They're not humans. Human-level intellect is a rare thing among Pokemon and only some species have it, such as Slowking, Lapras and some legendaries. It's rather unethical to capture and enslave those ones, considering they are most certainly sentient, but then you're saying that all Pokemon are? The first thing I think when I see a character like that is "wow, that character must be a real git. He/She KNOWS that they are sentient, yet they force them under their control anyway. Hating now." There is a lot wrong with the Pokemon world when you look at it from an objective angle already, no need to make it worse.

To be honest, I really hate it when people put "Pokemon-ese" dialouge in their roleplay posts.

Example:

"We did it Pikachu~"

"Pika-pi-pikachu~"

.... << Yes those people I'd like to strangle. The way I've personally done it except when something like a telepathic link has been established is just emotions because that's easily read. I imply quite a bit and avoid inputting direct dialogue unless it's pretty much necessary to do so.

As far as keeping conversation going, the easiest way I've found around that is to have pokemon talk with eachother.

It's been done in the show since the Island of Giant Pokemon [Tho Technically the [i]adorable scene between Pikachu and Caterpie could also be considered the first real example indepth pokemon-to-pokemon discussion] and it's feasible in roleplays as well. One of the ones I was in, the pokemon bonded more than the trainers in the actual roleplay did. :o

pokemongarnet

April 27th, 2010, 04:36 PM

do you mean other peoples pokemon with your pokemon or the pokemon in your team? not the most important question. I think that pokemon bonding can be good to have but it could take away from the actual story or add to it.

An entire thread? Just to complain? YES.

Hello! I'm shy except not really. - Not shy characters in general. Those can be done very well. I mean when the sign-ups say they're shy, but they don't act that way at all in the roleplay. Most of the time it's put there as a sole 'fault', and is followed by something along the lines of 'but when you get to know him, he is super cool and awesome and will do anything for you!' Plus, shyness isn't really a fault. There's advantages and disadvantages to both introversion and extraversion.

There are no side effects to being neglected other than ANGST - I don't mind characters who were abused by their characters, or orphaned on the streets, or have a mental disorder, I really don't. Just make sure to prove it, rather than just having the characters go "B'AAAAW AS A CHILD MY DAD BEAT ME THEN KICKED ME OUT". If they're living on the streets and are malnourished, it's going to have an effect. If it goes on long enough, certain vitamin shortages can lead to effects such as stunted growth and being blind. Just do some research on what effects it'd have, it only takes a quick google search.

We're so dumb, slavery is okay to us! - Hello, one day you were walking around when a nice dominant species went by and caught you. You now get to participate in **** battles! For some reason, you have no problem with this.

But seriously, this has been something that's been bugging me for ages. No, I'm not saying that every pokemon has to secretly hate the trainer. If they've been raised from an egg, captured young, want a trainer to help then grow stronger, and a thousand other scenarios, they could actually appreciate being captured. However, not every pokemon will automatically accept the fact that they're being taken away from their families, their environment, and life as they know it, especially if they're a strong and experienced pokemon. Even one that refuses to follow the trainer's orders and battles in it's own way instead would be good. Just anything instead of 'MY TRAINER IS THE BEST EVER DESU.'

LOOK AT MY DAZZLING BLUE EYES - This doesn't bug me, but it's just slowly started to creep me out over the years. Most characters have electric/dazzling/sapphire/-insert prose here- blue eyes. Tons of characters are slightly chubby or muscular, but never completely obese or a complete meathead. I understand, it's fun to play some attractive, socially capable character. It's even more fun to play a character who has major flaws. I know this from experience. lD
Hey in Id Est Damnum Innocante, im playing a slighty muscular person but it fits their hobby. I think i might try to play a fat person.

Izanagi

April 27th, 2010, 04:47 PM

In defense of people who mostly RP by themselves, it's because some RPs have members who are extremely inactive and unreliable. Which is another bad habit that annoys me.

pokemongarnet

April 27th, 2010, 05:23 PM

I hate when that^^^ happens, especially if it's early on in the RP

Macaroni

April 28th, 2010, 02:11 AM

do you mean other peoples pokemon with your pokemon or the pokemon in your team? not the most important question. I think that pokemon bonding can be good to have but it could take away from the actual story or add to it.

Hey in Id Est Damnum Innocante, im playing a slighty muscular person but it fits their hobby. I think i might try to play a fat person.

I don't mind it so much if it fits their hobby and lifestyle. Just when they're randomly muscular with no given excuse. Yours is good. C: PFF YES FAT PEOPLE YES we need more of those in the RP section.

To be honest, I really hate it when people put "Pokemon-ese" dialouge in their roleplay posts.

I do agree with this, but only when it's pointless. There have been roleplays where the RPers have had to be by themselves for a while, and they need to find a way to meet the quota. Though I do agree that it's gets annoying if it seems pointless, or they're having a whole conversation in which they can understand the pokemon, rather than one where they're just understanding verbal cues or it seems one-sided.

So as long as it's not pointlessly long or

"Hey Smeargle, what's your favorite color to paint with?"

"Smearg!"

"Woah, red's my favorites too!"

"Smeargle gle mear!"

"I never knew you liked impressionism!"

Mika

April 28th, 2010, 06:40 AM

I do agree with this, but only when it's pointless. There have been roleplays where the RPers have had to be by themselves for a while, and they need to find a way to meet the quota. Though I do agree that it's gets annoying if it seems pointless, or they're having a whole conversation in which they can understand the pokemon, rather than one where they're just understanding verbal cues or it seems one-sided.

So as long as it's not pointlessly long or

"Hey Smeargle, what's your favorite color to paint with?"

"Smearg!"

"Woah, red's my favorites too!"

"Smeargle gle mear!"

"I never knew you liked impressionism!"

That would be an example of what I'm talking about. By itself, that dialouge seems pointless, there's nothing explain why the trainer is able to understand the pokemon. If you look at Ash/Pikachu, Pikachu is descriptive in its flailing arm movements etc when it tries to explain something to Pikachu. I'd be fine with the above, if you added something to the ends of the lines, say something like this:

"Hey Smeargle, what's your favorite color to paint with?" He cast a glance at the paints in front of him before looking his pokemon in the eye.

"Smearg!" With a flick of his tail, he pointed directly at the red. It wasn't the red one might align with blood or even a tomato. It was a true juicy red color, an apple of sorts.

"Woah, red's my favorite too!" He smiled, returning to his artwork, the pokemon directly over his shoulder, gazing at his work with a critical eye.

"Smeargle gle mear!" Dipping his tail in the paint, the pokemon began to work on its own piece of work. The strokes were delicate, precise, and at the same time open and free.

"I never knew you liked impressionism!"

It's a total crap shoot post I threw together in like 5 minutes but do you see the difference? One leaves wayyy too much up to the reader, the other somewhat reads like an anime scene. :o I still personally wouldn't use Pokemonese here but I wouldn't fault anyone who did.

pokemongarnet

April 29th, 2010, 03:29 PM

That would be an example of what I'm talking about. By itself, that dialouge seems pointless, there's nothing explain why the trainer is able to understand the pokemon. If you look at Ash/Pikachu, Pikachu is descriptive in its flailing arm movements etc when it tries to explain something to Pikachu. I'd be fine with the above, if you added something to the ends of the lines, say something like this:

"Hey Smeargle, what's your favorite color to paint with?" He cast a glance at the paints in front of him before looking his pokemon in the eye.

"Smearg!" With a flick of his tail, he pointed directly at the red. It wasn't the red one might align with blood or even a tomato. It was a true juicy red color, an apple of sorts.

"Woah, red's my favorite too!" He smiled, returning to his artwork, the pokemon directly over his shoulder, gazing at his work with a critical eye.

"Smeargle gle mear!" Dipping his tail in the paint, the pokemon began to work on its own piece of work. The strokes were delicate, precise, and at the same time open and free.

"I never knew you liked impressionism!"

It's a total crap shoot post I threw together in like 5 minutes but do you see the difference? One leaves wayyy too much up to the reader, the other somewhat reads like an anime scene. :o I still personally wouldn't use Pokemonese here but I wouldn't fault anyone who did.

mmm, actually, Smeargle has juices flowing through it's body into it's tail which colors it, Smeargle is one of my favs, i should know. just kidding.

anyhowww, I dislike when people have such a generic character and a generic journey. interview. "so uh how'd you get that squirtle there?"
"Oh professor oak gave it to me."
" and that caterpie "
"naah, it's not interesting, i just caught it."
"Oh I see."
end interview

Down with the darkness

May 2nd, 2010, 11:15 AM

anyhowww, I dislike when people have such a generic character and a generic journey. interview. "so uh how'd you get that squirtle there?"
"Oh professor oak gave it to me."
" and that caterpie "
"naah, it's not interesting, i just caught it."
"Oh I see."
end interview

I hate it when a pokemon professor just randomly gives a trainer an exceptionally rare pokemon for no particular reason! Proffesor Birch isn't going to give every single new trainer one of his very rare pokemon! In the games, he gives you it so you can perform an errand, and when you return, he is impressed by the bond you formed so he lets you keep it. YOU NEED A REASON!

I hate the generic trainer who does the typical eight badges, then fights the pokemon league. NOT EVERY TRAINER IS OUT FOR GYM BADGES. The pokemon world is FULL of breeders and researchers, and people who are just in it for the fun of it!

I personally am okay with trainers talking to their pokemon in English, as long as it's not a 2 way street.

Kon~

May 2nd, 2010, 11:26 AM

I get so annoyed by Mary-Sue SUs.

I recently joined an RP, and two of the three SUs above mine had unusual scars or birthmarks, and tragic pasts within which their biological parents died etc. etc.

I at least try to keep mine feasible, like making someone look human and perhaps having some form of mild peril in the childhood for character building.

"Piercing blue" eyes or eyes that "can stare into your soul" are too overused and I can't bear them any more. ._.

pokemongarnet

May 2nd, 2010, 04:32 PM

Tragedy in the character's life prior to the RP can be good, to an extent however.

I Laugh at your Misfortune!

May 2nd, 2010, 07:26 PM

Tragedy in the character's life prior to the RP can be good, to an extent however.

Almost anything can be good to a certain extent. A lot of it comes down to how it's played out.

Melody

May 19th, 2010, 05:55 PM

I'm probably going to be crucified for saying this but this is a bad habit I see in far too many regular RPers anyways. It's arrogance. Most decent RPers get so darn mad at the newbie who is trying to get into RPing that they foam at the mouth and essentially give them such a hard time that the RP becomes a CHORE.

Seriously, when it gets to the point where you're obsessing over minor details in your posts being too close to a 'bad RPer' mistake, I honestly think it's time to stop and take a break from it. RPing is about fun, you're not trying to write a cotton-picking group novel!

Now with that being said, I can understand the basic frustrations at god-modding and poor characters and very poor posts, those are actually legitimate concerns, but by no means should we stone the n00b to death for missing a few commas consistently or having poor spelling. (especially if they have poor English skills.)

All of the above reasons are the top reasons why I seldom participate in RP forums...people forget about the fun of RPing together and instead start bashing each other for making mistakes. As I said before, getting mad at the newb who makes others' characters do things they wouldn't usually do and fails at god-modding anyways, is quite understandable, but if it's the case of a well written post, why fight it unless they do it CONSTANTLY!?

Loki

June 3rd, 2010, 11:13 AM

I'm probably going to be crucified for saying this but this is a bad habit I see in far too many regular RPers anyways. It's arrogance. Most decent RPers get so darn mad at the newbie who is trying to get into RPing that they foam at the mouth and essentially give them such a hard time that the RP becomes a CHORE.

Seriously, when it gets to the point where you're obsessing over minor details in your posts being too close to a 'bad RPer' mistake, I honestly think it's time to stop and take a break from it. RPing is about fun, you're not trying to write a cotton-picking group novel!

Now with that being said, I can understand the basic frustrations at god-modding and poor characters and very poor posts, those are actually legitimate concerns, but by no means should we stone the n00b to death for missing a few commas consistently or having poor spelling. (especially if they have poor English skills.)

All of the above reasons are the top reasons why I seldom participate in RP forums...people forget about the fun of RPing together and instead start bashing each other for making mistakes. As I said before, getting mad at the newb who makes others' characters do things they wouldn't usually do and fails at god-modding anyways, is quite understandable, but if it's the case of a well written post, why fight it unless they do it CONSTANTLY!?

Hm, that's a really good point. oxo
Pachy 1 World 0

But at the same time, in my past experiences, when better roleplayers start nitpicking on posts, it's usually in roleplays that set the bar at a certain level in the first place, so honestly, those who got picked on were asking for it. xD; You don't join an adv. literate roleplay when you're semi-lit- you just don't do it unless you're ready to get torn apart. And if you join with the mindset that you'll improve by roleplaying with better people, you have to take their advice and make changes- because they usually know what they're doing.

Yet at the same time, a "well-written" post really depends on who's looking at it. Different people have different standards, and the element of roleplaying is about cooperating with each other- because an RP is a team effort. Which brings me to my pet peeve...

When people are so determined and stubborn to get their own way that they can't see the reasoning of the other side. Oh man and this is usually a two-way street! Being considerate of other people and their wishes is the only way to keep a roleplay alive! It's what keeps everyone from godmodding their butts off, and I hate it when people don't make compromises for each other- it's absolutely ridiculous.

adventure

June 8th, 2010, 01:05 PM

I'm probably going to be crucified for saying this but this is a bad habit I see in far too many regular RPers anyways. It's arrogance. Most decent RPers get so darn mad at the newbie who is trying to get into RPing that they foam at the mouth and essentially give them such a hard time that the RP becomes a CHORE.

Seriously, when it gets to the point where you're obsessing over minor details in your posts being too close to a 'bad RPer' mistake, I honestly think it's time to stop and take a break from it. RPing is about fun, you're not trying to write a cotton-picking group novel!

Now with that being said, I can understand the basic frustrations at god-modding and poor characters and very poor posts, those are actually legitimate concerns, but by no means should we stone the n00b to death for missing a few commas consistently or having poor spelling. (especially if they have poor English skills.)

All of the above reasons are the top reasons why I seldom participate in RP forums...people forget about the fun of RPing together and instead start bashing each other for making mistakes. As I said before, getting mad at the newb who makes others' characters do things they wouldn't usually do and fails at god-modding anyways, is quite understandable, but if it's the case of a well written post, why fight it unless they do it CONSTANTLY!?

Thank you. I was just going to ask what about the new ones, or the ones who don't have English as their first language... or me, who's both.

I haven't dared trying an RP yet, because frankly I don't know how to do it. But that's my problem.

Nao, go on with your criticism of each other, and remember to be nice to RP noobs :3